Growing Up With You
by HadenXCharm
Summary: When we met, I was just a stupid kid. I probably drove you nuts, but you never sent me away. I remember those long summers together when I was trying so hard to become a man, and you made thing seem so easy. That kid is a warrior now, but I still remember. I'm proud, this is who I've become, and I will not falter. I will not look back. (Twin-fic to Growing Out of Me - Ikkaku POV)
1. Chapter 1

When I first meet you, I look at you like the stars that shine. You're so pretty, I can't believe it. Wow _..._ I didn't even know that things that pretty even _exist._ I wonder how you got like that and I know it couldnta' been by accident. You must be an angel. I have to follow you.

Of course, I figure out that you're not actually an angel, because where are you wings, otherwise? Maybe even though I know that, I still stay because you feed me. I didn't know right away that you have spirit power like me, but when you offer to buy me meat even though I just kicked your sweetie in the junk, I say yes right away. How can a hungry boy like me resist?

I thought you might've been mad and just wanted to go kill me somewhere like you were with that guy, but ugh, that meat is so good. I can't help myself, I just can't help it, and I come with you and I eat so much. I can't remember the last time that I ate because I legally bought something. I try not to steal, because I'm not very good at it, but it's not like I'm just going to _find_ bread or fish laying in the middle of the woods. Gotta' eat somehow.

I keep following you and you keep feeding me. I love you.

You walk in front of me, always in front of me, and your hair is so pretty from here. I'm not short for my age, but I'm shorter than you are, and your hair is right there, so close by. It's dark and long and shiny like a fish's back. It's beautiful.

The first time I touch, you jump so high that I thought you'd hurt yourself by stepping on a stick or something, but you whip around and look at me, eyes so wide that I can see white all the way around the purple part. I put my hand on my mouth, because I feel bad. You're mad at me, aren't you, and I feel so bad that I can't stop looking at my feet. You tell me not to do that again, _ever,_ and I don't. I don't, but I always remember how it felt. It was so soft, softer than a bunny's fur.

I pick you handfuls of flowers, and sometimes you say they're weeds, but I can't see the difference. You know the names, and I didn't even know flowers _had_ names. You know tree names too and rock names and you never forget _my_ name either. You never call me 'stupid' or 'gaki' or 'bozu' or 'bastard', and you don't say to me, 'fuck off.' I love you.

You don't talk so much, but I try hard to get you to, because everything you say is important. It sounds that way, at least. You don't look old, but you know a lot of things. When my shinai started falling apart because I let it rest in a puddle for too long, you figured out how to fix it by drying some new bamboo and tying it in with a piece of cloth.

Yumichika, you're so smart. I love you. I love you so much, Yumichika.

I walk behind you, and you look back a lot. I don't know why. Why do you do that, huh? I'm right here. I'm even holding your hand most of the time, so it's not like you're thinking I got lost. I wonder why you do that so much. It can't be _me_ that you're looking back at, because I'm obviously right here. I turn around a lot too because you make it seem like someone's following us, but no one is. It's just me, and it's just you.

I'm so happy I'm with you. You're so weird, but I think you're good. I like you. You're prettier than everyone and smarter than everyone, and even though I guess you're not nice, you're not mean to me either, and that's pretty good, I think. You are really good, and I want to stay with you. You keep on letting me hang around, and I'm so happy.

I know you think I'm annoying, because I can see so on your face. Your nose crinkles when I get more dirty than usual, and you don't really smile at all. Not even when I make a fish-face. I don't get why. _I'm_ happy with _you,_ aren't I? I'm smiling all the time. Don't you like me too? No one else does, but I think that you must, because you don't tell me to go away and you don't leave without me.

I'd think you were trying to, if it wasn't for all the times you look back for me.

My steps are smaller than yours, even though my legs are long and stupid and skinny like a dumb bird. I have to walk fast to keep up, even though I can hardly see you talking a step under that kimono. You walk so calmly that it's like you're floating or something, because your feet are so quiet. You wrap your yukata so that the neckline is really high, and your hands are always hiding in those sleeves, and it makes me want to get inside there and be hugged and warm. My momma would let me inside her coat. She'd carry me, but you don't. You never do. I was so tired that one time, but you still wouldn't. I guess I'm too big for that now anyways, huh.

Screw it though, I'm still holding your hand. I'm not too old for _that,_ and I'm gonna' do it, cause' I wanna'. You don't get to hide your hand in that sleeve all the time with _me_ here. I'm gonna' grab your hand as many times as it takes. It's not like you ever pull away, but when I let go and get distracted, back it goes, like you're trying to hide. I won't let you. I want to hold your hand so that we're always together.

I really really like you, Yumichika. I love you. You're so beautiful. You're so cool. I have to hug you so that you know. I have to give you a kiss, because I can't hold all of this in. I like you so much. I wanna' be near you all the time. I don't think you like it, but you don't tell me no, so I keep on hugging you, petting you, holding your hand. You don't smile, so I think you're sad about something. You're all alone except for me, so I'll be your friend. My mom told me that sometimes sad people just need to feel that someone cares. Maybe you're so lost and lonely that you won't know that I care unless I touch. I don't have enough words to say it, and I can't control it, so I have to touch.

Yumichika, you're so cool. I want you to like me this much too.

You always know things beforehand, don't you? I get into trouble a lot because I think I know what I'm doing, but then it turns out that I really don't. I feel really stupid when that happens. I talk a lotta' crap, don't I? You don't seem real to me with the way you know things. How can you _know_ so many things? How do you have so much self-control of your body that you've never lost your temper or yelled or hit me, that you've never spanked me?

I want to be like you.

You always seem to know everything, you're so smart. You'll tell me things before they happen, and then I'll realize that I've gotten hurt in the past by doing the exact same thing and that you were right. I might get sick in the rain you say, and I have before from playing in it. I probably won't be able to make a jump that big, you say, and you're right, I've missed in the past and hurt myself. As long as you don't make it sound like I _have_ to listen, I do.

'That fall is too high, climb down a little further first,' you'll say, and I don't listen because I think I know better, and I leap from the tree. I twist my ankle around, and it hurts so bad. That's what I get for not listening to you. You always know. You know what's good, and I start listening.

I listen to those mean kids a lot too. Mean grown-ups, mean shinigami, mean shop-owners. I can't help but listen. It's easy for them to pick on me, I know it is, because I look different, don't I? It's not fair for them to say those things when they're not true. I'm not stupid, I'm not ugly, I'm not worthless, right? I'm not, I'm not, and I repeat this over and over, but the words never come out right when the moment comes, and I get so frustrated when I try to tell them to stop that I can't say _anything_ and before I know it, I'm _crying._ I'm so mad and embarrassed, I'm so _mad_ and I want to _do_ something, but it all just comes out as tears. I'm the worst. I'm a baby.

You're always so calm when I'm a mess. You never cry, Yumichika. I bet grown-ups never cry.

I always walk behind you, with you in front of me, so I can see where you are. I like looking at you. I want to feel your hair again so bad. I don't think I've ever wanted anything so badly. I wonder how it feels on your neck. Is it ever itchy or annoying? Does it get in your face and poke your eyes? I want to feel it so badly. I think I had hair when I was little. I think I did, but I'm not sure.

The other boys tease me all the time and it makes me so mad. I have to try hard not to cry and kick a tree when I think about it. Sometimes I can't _stop_ thinking about it and I start crying anyway. It makes me so mad to think about the stuff they say. They make me so _so_ mad that I can't even talk. I hate them. It's not my fault that I can't grow anything on my head. It's not. If I could, then I would, but I can't. All they do is try to make me feel bad, and it works every time. Someday, someday it won't hurt, I tell myself, but I don't believe that. I'm always gonna' look like this, and people are always gonna' tease me for it. I'll always feel bad about it. I'll grow up maybe, but I'll always remember what they said. I'm so mad. I hate being this way. I hate that they always have to remind me of that. I feel like freak. I hate myself.

I feel like a lizard boy.

You don't touch me to comfort me. You never do, and I don't know why. My mom used to hug me and hold me a lot, and I crave that, I want it so bad, but you never do. Come to think of it, you never even pat my back in return when I hug you. I mean, I'm not tall enough yet, but I can pull you down around the shoulders or hug you under the armpits, but you could hug me any time you wanted, and you don't, so I have to do it. You don't look like you like it, but you don't push me away. What I'd do to know what could make you hug me back.

When I was like seven or eight and I was starting out on my own and I'd start crying, it'd be a dumb circle of me almost calming down and then getting mad again and crying again, and it didn't stop until I cried so hard that I threw up or I got tired out and fell asleep. It was the saddest, worst thing in the world. I'm awful.

Now that you're here, you of course see me when I lose control of myself, but you don't comfort me. I want you to hold me so badly. I want you to put your arms around me and rub my back until I can calm down, but you never do.

My arms are hugging my knees, and my head is resting there as I sob and shakily tell you what happened. I feel like a baby, and the embarrassment of it just makes the bad feeling worse. I feel so stupid in front of you like this, and you won't touch me or look at me. I'm a mess. "They said it again," I choke out angrily, hitting the ground repeatedly and wailing. It wasn't fair, it wasn't fair that they could say that. They don't have a weak point like I do. They don't have something that I can talk about that will turn them into this weak mess, like they do for me.

"Ikkaku, I don't accept self-pity," you say quietly, resolutely looking the other way, sitting in a seiza like nothing's going on, like I'm not screaming my head off over here. I get through with my tantrum, my arms and legs getting tired out, and I just clasp my hands over my mouth, snuffling and gasping uncontrollably, trying to calm my breaths, but it doesn't work. I need you to rub my back and help me breathe slower. I shuffle over to you and put my face against your arm. You gently push my body away and I flop over dramatically with a sob at the rejection.

I ball up on the ground and sniffle. I want my mom.

"You have one minute to stop crying, or I'm walking away," you say, and I know you mean it. You've done it before. I have to get my body under control or I'm going to be crying by myself in the woods. If I get it together, I have the opportunity to stay near you.

"Okay," I whimper miserably, and I wipe my eyes. I take a long sniff and a deep breath and I feel much better.

You give me a satisfied look and stand up. I scrub at my face with my knuckles and wrists until I don't feel so sticky. My diaphragm hitches every once in a while without my control, and it takes almost an hour for that to stop, but otherwise it's like nothing ever happened. You don't bring it up and I'm glad you don't. I'm so embarrassed by it. I'm too big for this, aren't I. I'm too old, but I can't help it.

I wish you would hold me when I'm crying. I don't cry when I'm sad, but I can't take embarrassment. I feel so ashamed of myself that I can't help but bawl, and it just makes me feel worse. The problem is I can't stop once I get started. Sometimes I seriously _can't_ and you walk off and leave me until I cry myself out. It'd be easier if you'd just help me feel better. I want you to hold me and tell me that I'm not those things that those people call me. I try to hug you when I cry, but you don't let me.

Maybe you think I'm ugly too, like they do. You call stuff ugly all the time, and I feel ugly too. You don't love me, do you. I touch you because I love you, but you don't touch me. Hardly ever. You don't love me. You won't hold me and you don't want me close. Don't you care when I feel bad? Why don't you care when I cry? Can't you see that I'm breaking apart? It'd be so easy for you to help me, why won't you? Hold me, hold me together, _please._

"They did it again!" I'm screaming this time and kicking my legs. I'm so mad! I am so _mad!_ I hit my shinai against a tree as hard as I can and the force rattles up my arms. I want to break their skulls, I want to knock their teeth in. How dare they, how _dare_ they, it isn't fair! "They called me it _again_ ," I blubber, finally calming down from my tantrum and breaking into tears, dropping down to my knees. I am such a mess. They're right about me.

You won't hold me. You won't even look at me. My face is ugly like this, isn't it, red from tears, wet from snot, drawn into a ghastly grimace as I wail at the sky. Why was I born like this? You won't hold me and I can't stop crying. I feel like a lizard and I can't stand it.

I want my mother.

"They keep saying it!" I howl, sobbing once and then screaming until I feel my throat hurt. I flop onto my hands and knees and cry, watching the ground get wet.

"But you beat them up, didn't you," you say plainly, turning away from me. I paused in my crying for a moment, breath shaking. I _did_ beat them up. You're right.

But... I hadn't been quick enough to keep them from saying it in the first place though. I'd still had to hear it. I'd still had to be humiliated. My lip quivers and I shake with rage, my eyes welling up. I try to keep my mouth shut to keep the crying inside, but it doesn't work. It still comes out. My eyelashes are sticking together now and I can't focus on anything, nothing is here inside me but me being angry and hurt and upset.

You still don't look at me, so bland in your tone. "Become even stronger, and they won't dare open their mouths against you." I blink my wet eyes.

I wonder if a day like that will come where they'll be so afraid of me that they would never speak cruelly to me, I wonder if I could become that strong that they wouldn't dare insult me.

I wonder if one day I could become a warrior, and when people see me the first thing they note won't be how strange I look, but how strong I look.

I sniffle, my howls ending as I lapse into silence, hiccuping and sniffing every once in a while. You've told me things like this before, to become stronger, and I try. It makes me feel so much better when you say things like that, because now there's something I can do about it. I don't have to sit here and take it when the screams come out of me. I can do something about it, I don't have to let this happen. You know everything, don't you. You're so smart, Yumichika.

I feel pathetic, I feel so ashamed, but I pull myself together. It gets easier every time, and soon, I'm whimpering, not blubbering, I'm sniffling, not whimpering, and before I know it I'm just telling you about how I feel instead of ever even breaking into tears. Those days of me being unable to stop myself from screaming and wailing are gone.

You tell me to get stronger, but you never say 'take it like a man', or 'man up', or 'shake it off' like he always did... You don't say 'it's okay', or 'they're wrong' like _she_ did. You tell me to _prove_ them wrong. I do. I always do. When I grow up, I'm never gonna' let anyone make a fool outta' me. I'll be strong enough then to shut them up.

I'll get stronger, until those words don't hurt anymore.

I feel calmer, more in control of myself now, and I'm so proud. I hope you can tell, I hope you notice that I'm doing what you said to do and that I feel so much better. I'm not a mess now unless I choose to be. I have a choice and you showed me that. I don't have to be a slave to their words. I be what I choose to be. I feel more like you. I feel much calmer, and I don't feel like an explosion waiting to happen.

Now that I'm not in distress all the time or having fights with those guys, I have more time to play, and I start making different friends, friends who know that I'll beat them up if they don't show me the same respect that I show them. I'm not mean, I don't think I'm mean to them, but they know not to mess with me. We play, but I always come back to you after a little while. I should probably feel like a little kid around you, but I don't. I feel like a man with you.

We leave our district together, and I don't complain. I don't have anything here that I'm leaving behind really. I like to travel with you, although I don't understand why you're always looking back when you lead. We're not going anywhere in particular, right? So what does it matter? What do you have to be unsure of?

I start to pay closer attention to you now that we're spending all day every day together, walking from the early morning until about an hour before sunset. You seem to know people everywhere, at least that's what I assume, since you talk to a lot of men with a smooth voice and a little smile that you never use around me. You let _them_ touch you, and I don't understand. Why don't you let _me?_ Don't you like me too?

"Why did that man spank you?" I ask one day, because I'd been pondering it for about an hour but couldn't figure out why. "Is he your dad?" I wonder.

"He's old enough to be," you mumble.

"Huh?" I don't understand, but you don't explain.

That guy turns up again when I'm playing with you. You don't play with me very often, but you were today, and I don't want to be interrupted by this man. I'm having so much fun playing that I don't want your attention to be taken away from me. He's grinning really wide and I don't like the looks of his yellow teeth. I wonder if I'll grow hair on my face like that when I become a man, and I hope I don't. How could this guy be your friend? He's… he's really ugly.

You tell me that you want to play hide and seek, and that I should hide first. I don't want to. You were just teaching me to play pick-up sticks and I want to finish. That guy makes a low sound but I ignore him. He's not the boss of me. I tell you that I don't want to play hide and seek right now, I want to finish our game. You tell me again to go hide so that you can come find me. It's a game, you say. It'll be fun.

I don't want to. I was about to win pick-up sticks. Besides, I know this game. I know how you play hide-and-seek. You're a bad seeker. You take so long. I tell you I don't like that game and that I want to stay with you guys.

That man hits me in the side of the head so hard that I feel like my brain rattles in my skull. He actually boxed my ear. He really _hit_ me. "Owww!" I yell, and I scowl viciously and kick him in the ankle. He hits me again, and you're there, you're watching, but you don't tell him to stop.

You look nervous and it scares me. I stop short from where I was punching him over and over in his stomach. The hairs on my back stand up. I didn't know that you got afraid of anything. If you're afraid, then there's something to be afraid of. I'd better listen.

"Ikkaku, I'd like you to go hide. I'll start counting right now," you say calmly, eyes telling me to _go._

I say 'okay' and run off. I could hear you start counting, but after a bit, I was far enough away that I couldn't hear you anymore. I hide in a tree for a really long time. I sing some songs and kick my legs, I hang from the branches, I mope, and when you finally find me, you're by yourself and you don't look so good.

"I hated him," I tell you, and I climb down. I'm jealous and mad, but it's okay. You're back now, and we can play some more.

"Yes, what a filthy man," you agree, and your voice sounds scratchy.

You say you ache and you don't feel like playing now. You must have gotten tired out from playing with him. I'm so jealous that I feel like hitting something.

We go into town together later in the week, and after we eat, we're walking down the dusty road, and the back of my neck starts prickling, and I feel sick. Dread claws up my spine and up ahead I think I see _him_. It's not him, but it looks like him. You and he have never met, but I must have seen him before, because he's familiar. He's tall and big, and I don't like him. My knees are hurting and wobbling around. I don't think I can walk in a straight line.

To my dismay, he comes up to us and starts talking to you. Oh no, are you friends with him _too?_ You're giving that little smile and touching your neck slightly. No, don't talk to him. Take us away from here, I beg in my head.

He gets mean and scowly and leans close to your face. I'm so scared that I think I'm going to pee. I think I'm going to throw up, but I just hold onto your belt, standing behind you. It's stupid, because he's way bigger than you too, but you're so calm, like things are okay. Things _must_ be okay then. You know what to do. You know what to do, you always do, and as long as you're there, I will be safe. I just have to stay back here, and I'll be safe. You'll keep me safe.

I hold onto you tight, but you push me off without even looking at me. I'm huddling behind you, bunching myself up really small, hoping that he won't look at me, that he won't see me, but you're walking off, leaving me there by myself. Immediately, my throat closes up and hurts like it always did before I had a meltdown. I'm panicking and I think I'm gonna' throw up. I really think I'm going to throw up, I'm going to cry, you have to stay here with me, he's _looking_ at me!

I stand there for a second staring up at the guy, shaking slightly, and I feel my knees going weak as this smile slowly spreads on his face. I feel a breath leave me and suddenly I'm running, I'm running after you and whimpering softly. I miss my mom, I want my mom, but I only have you. Please, please don't turn me away. I can't be by myself with him back there watching me go.

You're the grown-up, I need your guidance, I need your reassurance. "What if he follows us?" I whine helplessly, looking back over and over. I need you to say it'll be okay, that you'll kill him, that you'll beat him up and not let him hurt me.

"What will you do if that happens?" you ask in return, and I pause...

Maybe if he follows us, I'll pop his eye out and bite him. I tell you that out loud, and you nod in satisfaction. You don't say anything else and I wonder for a minute why you'd even...

Huh.

I already feel a little braver.

I stop turning around and just hurry after you.

Your advice was always like that, cryptic, and it made me think for myself. It was never easy things, it was never openly loving, and it made me feel powerless, but eventually it seemed to work. Sink or swim was a pretty risky method, but lucky for me, I could swim pretty okay once I got going. How did you always know it would work? It must be because you're a grown-up. You just know these things.

I've never thought of you as my father, or even my older brother. You're not my 'nii-san' or my 'aniki', you're just Yumichika. You're just… _there_ , I guess. You're not the boss of me, you'd don't tell me my bedtime or punish me ever, but I still need you like nothing else I've ever felt.

Maybe you remind me a little of my older sister when she was around. I never thought you were a girl of course, not even once, but it's just that only girls out here are pretty, and you're just so beautiful. Your face, I just love your face.

I like you so much, Yumichika. I'm so full of beans, I'm so wound-up and I want to share that with you. You're so calm and flat sometimes that I want to try to wake you up. I have so much energy, I want to run and play, but you don't. You want to sit and rest, but I want to play. Please play with me. Don't you think I'm fun?

I've accepted that you don't like wrestling or getting dirty. You pet every single toad and bird and snake that I catch to show you. You say thank you when I pick pretty leaves and flowers and give them to you. You won't play leap-frog no matter how much I ask, you absolutely refuse to wrestle, or dig holes, or play in the rain. You always say you're too tired or that you're sore.

You don't like to play, I guess. Maybe grown-ups just don't like playing anymore. The only kind of playing you ever do is when I absolutely _beg_ , or when you meet with those guys. You've called them your playmates before when I ask if they're your friends. I wonder what kind of games grown-ups play. They must be secret. I think that for a long time and I'm jealous. Maybe when I grow up, then you'll play with me.

We stay in an inn for the first time instead of sleeping in a field, and I'm excited to sleep in the bed. Aw man, it's been _ages_ since I slept in a bed. The straw pokes me all over and it's really itchy, but it's raining today and I don't want to sleep in the wet grass outside. It doesn't smell good in here, but I can fall asleep easy with you next to me. You're so soft and warm, your heartbeat… oh…

Once when I came back from playing, I heard noises and waited outside our door, because it was closed and had something tied around the handle. I didn't understand what you were doing, why a man opened the door and let me in after a while, and then left with a nod. What I did understand was that we ate that night and that we traded rooms for a better one. I didn't make the connection until I was tall enough to look in your eye without tilting my head up.

I know you don't like those ugly men. I know that you don't, that they're not really your friends, because even though you smile when you start talking to them, after they're gone, you don't smile. I think that when I grow up and become a man, I can marry you and then you won't have to touch those ugly guys ever again. You'll be happy with me, I promise. You'll smile all the time, only at me. We can get married, and I'll be your best friend. We'll go everywhere together forever.

It feels right, so it must be right.

I have to hurry and become a man. That way, you won't need those guys, you'll only need me. To grow up, I have to be stronger.

I want a sword so bad, but I'm not ready for it. I know I'm not. Even so, you get me a bokken, and I'm so happy. I look so cool with this. I let you have my shinai and we fight together if I beg you for long enough. You're so graceful. You beat me, but I'm learning fast. Oh, Yumichika, you're so cool. You move like water. I fix my grip like you show me and now I never drop this thing. When I have a sword, I will never drop it, I promise.

I want to become strong, I want to fight by your side. I have to grow up, but I know that I can't eat too much anymore. It occurs to me about the money – where exactly do you get it? You always have more and then more, but I don't think you have a job, since we're always moving from town to town. I think… I think you must get it from those men, but what do you have that they want? What would they pay for?

I think... I think you kiss men for money. I hope I'm wrong. I don't want you to. I think that you kiss men, and there aren't any good-looking men out here. I can't believe that you'd have to do something like that with ugly people, so I try to help the food last, I try to help the money last so that you don't have to do it so often. I'm so so hungry, but I pretend that I'm not as hungry as I really am.

You probably kiss men for money. That must be it, because they try touching you when they see you, they touch your body like they want to kiss you. Why _wouldn't_ they want to kiss you? You're the prettiest person out here and you're so nice to look at. They're probably lonely living someplace like this and they like you. They want to kiss you, and you let them if they pay maybe.

I obsess over this, and once I realize that you probably do that with all those guys you talk to, I make the connection between your smile before to lure them in, and your smile being gone afterwards. You want them to think you like it, but you really don't. It hurts you to do that, but you want money for us, you tell me I'm a growing boy and that I need lots of meat and eggs to be strong and healthy. You don't really like doing that with them. You do it because you have to. You don't really like it. Once I realize that, I don't kiss you ever again.

You might have to do it with them, but I'll never make you do it with me. I want you to be happy so bad. You're always so good to me, and you deserve to only smile. I want you to find a man that you _want_ to kiss. Sometimes you do and they'll come with us for a while.

Sometimes they really seem to like you too. I don't know why, but none of them ever seem to like me or want me around. You never tell them to leave me alone or knock it off, and I put up with it, because I can see how your eyes shine when they say they love you. I love you too, but you don't look at me like that. I love you too, Yumichika. I love you. Love me more than them. I was here first.

A man that you actually really liked leaves you. He'd been with us for three months, and then left. He was with someone else, and I could see that you're hurt, that you're insulted, because you walk around all day with this dazed look on your face. No matter what I do or say, you don't say a word, I can't shake you out of it.

You don't cry, but I can tell you're sad, you're really sad. You can't get up in the morning and you're just staring off to the side, lying on the ground motionless. I touch you, and you jerk wildly, but go still again. I heft you into my skinny arms and drag you into a sitting position. Your head flops lifelessly, and I swallow hard, lowering you back down.

How do I take care of you? Are you sick? Are you hurt? You can't be, I would know. You're just sad. You're so sad that I think you're dying. You won't move. You lay in my lap, and I hold your arms. I try to pick you up, but I can't quite do it. You're limp and heavy. Your head falls back and exposes your neck every time I stop holding it up. Your eyes are open, but you won't respond.

This is really scaring me. You always know what to do. You're the grown up. You can't be broken. You're the one who always fixes me, not the other way around. I don't know how to take care of you.

"Yumichika," I say, and I'm sniffling, because I can't stand to see this. I don't want to see this. "Yumichika, get up," I beg, but you don't move. I'm so scared. Yumichika, get up, please, you have to get up.

I hug you and sniffle. I beg and beg, but you don't move. " _Get up_ , Yumichika," I whine, shaking you once. I rub my head against your chest and sniffle more. You move slowly then, a hand lifting weakly to drop onto my back and stay there. You make a small noise and close your eyes. You're hurting, but I don't see any cuts. That man hurt your feelings and I can't make that better. He made you sad, so sad that you can't function. He kissed someone else. That's okay, I have to show you that it's okay. As long as you can still move, you'll be okay.

"Yumichika, you are so pretty," I say brightly, smiling and sniffing the last of my tears away. You look into my eyes, half-lidded and dull, but I see a spark. "I know you'll get another date really soon," I assure you, "They'll be really handsome too."

I figured out that you only like men, at least you seem too, because you never give women that same little sly smile that you give men. You never kiss women. You talk to them, sure, but it's not the way you talk to men. All of your sweethearts have been men, and I think that's okay, but I feel like it's not the best thing to do, because I don't know if there are any good men out here.

I tell you I'm sure that you'll find a good man, and you give me the smallest smile and one little laugh. You get up and start walking really slow. I hold your hand, and you actually squeeze me back, just one time.

Don't get heartbroke over bad men like that. They don't deserve for you to get like that because of them. Just stay with me. I will never hurt you.

You don't talk much, but I don't like the quiet. I tell you every story I know and I wonder if you think I'm funny, because sometimes you don't laugh at all, but I can still tell you liked it. You're so quiet, and you don't smile. I wonder if you're an angel again who lost their wings somehow. How could someone so pretty be so sad and gloomy?

I want to explore. We're in North Rukongai, but I want to see the west, east, and south too. Apparently, there's eighty districts for each of these partitions. I have to see more of them, I want to know what the people are like there. Surely there's someone nice out here for you.

We have traveled together for a really long time, it seems, and I don't know what I'd do by myself. I don't know if I'd like to wander around on my own. I'd probably just stay where I lost you and live by stealing again. I don't want to be like that, but I depend on you. You decide what our lives will be from one day to the next. I like it that way, you know best.

I'm getting older now. I can tell, because I've gotten a little taller, and my birthday has passed. I don't want you to come with me when I have to take a piss in the woods at night, even if it's spooky. I don't want you to watch me change when I need to dry my clothes. I don't want us to bathe together. I'm embarrassed, and I want privacy.

I don't want you to think of me as your boy. I want you to see that I'm a man, or nearly there. I might have a long way to go, but I don't want you to think you have to watch me while I'm in the river to make sure I haven't drowned. I don't want you to watch me get dressed. I don't want you to think that I'm so young that it's still okay for me to see _you_ getting dressed.

I'm going to be a man soon. I promise. I want you to be proud. I want you to think I'm tough. I take up chewing on wheat. I whack stuff with my bokken as we walk by. When I get too cocky, you put me in my place and tell me that talking to you that way is inappropriate and unacceptable. I don't dare sass you, I don't dare be disrespectful. I love you, and I'll never talk to you the way those guys do, but… who else can show me how to become a man? I don't want to be like them, but who can I look to for guidance? You're not my dad, you never will be, and I don't know how to act to become older.

Maybe I'm trying too hard. I just need to keep training and before I know it, I'll be big and strong. I don't need anyone but you, and once I'm a man, you won't need anyone but me either. I'll be your man.

You don't get another sweetheart for a long time, but I see you talking to men a lot. You smell sour after you go off on your own and come back in the morning. I don't know what it is, and you tell me it's alcohol, and I believe you. I smell sweat too. I wonder if you've been fighting.

One day, you come home, and I can tell right away that something has happened. You didn't lose a fight, because I see no wounds, but you are in pain. I can see that you're in pain, even though you don't cry or make a sound.

A man hurt you. I can tell. I know it right away and my neck is burning and prickling with dread and rage. I've accepted that you don't like girls the way most boys do. You want a man, you want to love a man, and I think that's okay, but the men out here are rough and they don't appreciate you.

They're usually nice to you, maybe a bit sleazy when I'm there, but I'm sure they become mean when you're by yourself with them, because you come back sad. I can tell something really bad happened this time. Someone hurt you. You're in so much pain. You're walking so slowly and we have to stop after about an hour because you can't go on. You say you're just tired and hungry, weak from dehydration, but I can see you limp. A man hurt you. I don't know how, I don't know where, but I know that a man did this to you. I must have vengeance for your pain.

The fury that bubbles within me is unlike anything I've ever felt, and when I finally see it happen, when I see and hear them jeer at you and call you names that I don't quite understand, I can't hold it in. They _pull_ your _hair._ I've never seen someone treat you that way, and what really gets me is that you _let_ them do it. You send me away when I get my butt handed to me, and I'm so ashamed of myself.

I sit in our room and wait all night. You take so long to fight them all, and I'm afraid they will kill you, that you won't come home. I'm tearing myself apart wondering why I hadn't been strong enough to help you. What if you die because I wasn't there for you, because I'd been a weak little kid? I'm trying so hard to grow up, but it's not happening fast enough. When you finally come back, I'm bawling like I never have before. I'm so angry and afraid for you, I'm furious that I couldn't help, that you'd had to offer yourself for my sake, that you'd sent me away.

You're perfectly fine, you look just fine, but I know you're not. I'm checking your body, I'm checking your face and your arms, but I don't see any cuts. You didn't fight them, then… but then how had you come back alive? I don't understand, and I know that you're hurt, but I can't figure out where, and it's driving me mad. I want to make you feel better, but I don't know how. I scream and cry into your lap, because it isn't fair. They hurt you, I know they hurt you, and it's not fair. Why would anyone want to hurt you? You didn't do anything to them but grace their eyes with your beauty, and they'd hurt you. I'm so angry at the world and those men and myself for not being strong enough to keep their hands off you.

I know now that you didn't like when they touched you; you were drained. This is why you're tired and sore. It happens in private, where I can't see, but I know that they don't ever touch you gently. When they touch you, they hurt you, and you don't like it. You never had, and you never would. That smile wasn't real. That smile that I had so envied them for being bestowed with, it wasn't real. That smile that I'd wanted you to use on me, it wasn't _real._ That smile was a fishing hook, a lure, just to make them want you, and why wouldn't they? You didn't do it because you liked them better. It wasn't because you actually liked them. You hated being touched, and once I figure that out, I never hug you again. You might have to do it with them, but you don't have to with me now. I love you, and I won't make you.

It happens again, and then another time, and I'm so upset. I'm so worried for you, because I know that you're being broken down a little at a time, but I don't know how to heal this wound that I can't see. How long has this happened? How long have they been doing this to you? How long have you done this before you met me? I'm so worried, I'm so mad that someone could hurt someone so beautiful. I love you, don't they love you too? They seem to when you first talk to them, but you come back looking fine, yet acting completely different. You're so tired, you're always so tired and sore. You say you're sore and that you can't play with me. You walk like a sick person, like you'll break apart at any moment, and I hold onto your arm. I won't let you fall.

I'm so hungry, but I promise myself that I won't let you near those men. Whatever you do with them is killing you, even if we need money. I'll hurt them if they come near. I'll hurt them so bad. I won't let them do it again. I can't keep you away from those men if you don't want to be kept away, but I won't let them take you and hurt you again. They're not scared of me, but I'm not scared of them either. I'll keep them away until you're better.

I can't bear the fact that I wasn't strong enough that time to fight at your side, to protect us both just like you were doing, but I will get stronger.

You talk more now, like you can feel my seriousness and want to bring me back to my lax ignorance. I can never go back all the way. I don't want to let my guard down and then find you dead. I'm a growing boy, but that doesn't mean you should be hurt every time you want to feed me.

I hold your arm, and you still walk in front, and we go slowly. You're sick. You're breathing through your mouth and your skin is yellowish. You need water. I have to get a job. I need to help feed us.

I do everything that I can, I search for money in the dirt, I pick through trash, I sweep floors, I chase away bad dogs from sheep, I watch babies for drunk fathers, and I get a few coins. You seem happy about it, but you only smile a little bit. I know from how your eyes look that this money isn't enough. I need more money. When I grow strong, I will be a bounty hunter and we can eat without worrying about money.

I find a shinigami badge in the dust one day, and I tell you about it with my black eye and sore teeth. "You really found a lieutenant's badge?"

"Yeah, but it got tooken away," I say, sniffing. My nose was bleeding again. They beat me up for it. I was gonna' sell it, but the shinigami came back for it. I hate them. I've met some okay ones, but they don't seem to really care about us.

"Where was it taken?" you ask pointedly, like you always do when you want me to reconsider my words, and I think for a minute. 'Taken', that sounds better in my ears.

"Taaaa'… Ta' the… Hm, I don't know, actually," I muse. "They just took it after they beat me up. I gave him a big bruise though, boy, was he mad!" I laugh, grinning widely.

You smile. You really smile.

I can feel my spirit energy growing as I train, and I train all the time. I will not let you be hurt again. I can't stop you from roaming at night, but I won't let that happen because of me again.

I will become stronger. I promise.

I wake in a cold sweat, and I can feel tears on my face. Suddenly, I'm crying hard, shocked, and holding my tummy. I roll to the side and crawl away as fast as I can, just before I throw up in the grass. I hurt, and I'm sniffling and smacking my lips. I spit a few times and let out a weak sob. I miss my mom.

You died. You died and you were bleeding. I couldn't see from where, but your clothes were red and your head rolled towards me. Your eyes were open. They hurt you. They touched your body while you were still warm, but you were already dead.

I can't stop crying, and I miss my mom.

You're lying awake and looking at me in the darkness. I take a few leaves and wipe out the inside of my mouth, spitting a few more times, weeping. I hurt all over. My stomach hurts. I have to get stronger, I have to. I promise I will. I won't let that happen.

I'm afraid that I'll fail. I'm not growing up fast enough.

I want to be held. I'm too old for it now, but I want to be held. You won't hold me. I know that you won't, so I don't try, but I still want you to anyways. I miss my mom, but it's you that I want now. I want you.

I shuffle over to you where the grass is still warm and flat where I'd been laying. I take a deep breath and look at the sky. You give a sleepy sigh and I tell you about the dream.

You put your hand on my chest, snaking it out to me and resting it there. It moves slightly with each of my heartbeats. "Now you," you whisper ever so softly, eyes glowing in the moonlight.

I reach out and move my hand over your yukata, and after a moment I put it inside onto your bare skin. You're warm. I want to snuggle you, but I don't. I won't hug you anymore, because I know you don't like when those men touch you. What if my embrace reminds you of them and you hate it? I won't do that. I will never do that.

I'm afraid, I'm so afraid. If you die, I'll be all alone. That was the scariest part of my nightmare, was waking up and thinking I was alone. I'm not alone, though. I feel your heart beat under my palm, and you're smiling wider now, looking into my eyes.

You never say 'I'll always be here', or 'It's okay'. You never have, because that's not true. But you're here now, and that's what you're trying to tell me.

I scootch closer into your personal space until our bodies touch just slightly. I'm so tired, and my heart is beating fast from that nightmare still, but you're here. You're alive. I can feel it against my hand. Each heartbeat between us is telling me, ' _live, live, live.'_ I feel it, and you feel it. I will live for you, and you for me. Deal? Are your eyes telling me that right now?

Your eyes drift closed in sleep and your hand slips down my chest a little. You whisper good night and sweet dreams.

I'm sniffling a little bit, but I smile.


	2. Chapter 2

TW - Graphic material

* * *

I'm stronger now, much stronger, and I'm happy about how big my bicep is when I flex. I don't feel skinny anymore, I feel lean. I feel like a fighter. My feet are bigger than yours, and so are my hands. I didn't realize that they would do that. When I was a kid, it was all about catching up to you, getting as tall and as big as you; it never really hit me that I might surpass you in size.

I'm gonna' have another growth spurt soon, I can feel it, but I already think I have more muscle strength than you. I could hold you down and beat you up, I'll bet, but I never will. I could probably hit you really hard, but I never will. I could probably treat you real bad, but I'm not gonna'. That's why I wanted to be a man. I want to be strong, stronger than you, so I can show you that it's possible to have power but still be a good person, that good men exist. I have to show you that even when I'm bigger than you, I can still treat you the same as I always did. I'm gonna' prove to you that even though there's bad guys out there, I'm not like that. I'm different. I'm not gonna' change.

You can trust me on that.

I walk next to you now, and you walk next to me. I like it like this. Your face is pretty much level with mine, and you're close enough that I don't have to be loud when I talk, I don't have to shout against the wind because I'm not behind you anymore.

I pick the path as often as you do, and sometimes we don't even decide out loud, almost like our feet are just somehow heading in the same direction without us having to think about it. It's nice.

I'm a lot taller than I was. I've gotten older, I've gotten taller, but you've stayed the same, almost like you're waiting for me to catch up. You don't change. Since I've met you, you haven't changed a bit, not even your hairstyle.

Me on the other hand, I've changed a lot. I've got an adam's apple, my voice dropped, my jaw is sharper, and I notice I've got a broader chest. I can't see my ribs anymore like I used to. My legs are a lot longer, my feet are bigger - I grew so much over my summers of being fourteen and fifteen that there are stretch marks on my sides. I'm definitely not a beefy guy, but I'm muscled and lean. I've trained hard for this.

My face hasn't gotten much better. I don't have baby fat in my cheeks anymore, and my eyes seem more slanted, my brow's harsher, and my nose is longer. I mostly just get acne on my shoulders and not my face, thank god, but I still feel ugly. I look in the river and I see a lizard looking back. I hate it. I still look like a lizard… _but_ it's a lizard that could fuck up some faces real good. Maybe a Komodo dragon. That's what's important. I look tough, and I am.

I don't grow hair on my jaw, but I get it in other places. It's not the best. It's itchy and it traps sweat, but it's not unbearable. I have growing pains still, even at seventeen, especially in my legs. My voice finally quit that annoying cracking thing a couple years ago. I wake up hard a lot too, and it freaks me out, because I still find myself waking up tangled around you even though I don't remember going to sleep that way. I hope you don't see the stains at least. I think I might die of embarrassment.

Luckily, the other guys talk about morning wood sometimes, so I don't feel like some weird freak who might be feeling you up at night or something. I guess it happens to everyone. Well, obviously not everyone. Not to girls. That would be dumb. Still, it's annoying to wake up and have that staring me in the face. Like _no,_ I was sleeping, why aren't _you_ sleeping? Get the fuck out of here.

It gets under my skin a little to know this is happening to me, because I've known, I've known for a while what you actually do with those men, and it horrifies me. What the fuck kind of torture have you been putting yourself through and for how long, going to bed with these creeps? All the money in the world wouldn't be worth that, and you're doing it for hardly enough to feed yourself with. What's worse is that I'm waking up hard all the time and I feel like I'm finally turning into one of those guys. Some part of my mind is telling me that it's the first step towards becoming what I hate most.

I'm sure I won't change, and even though this is what I wanted so badly, I'm a little worried about coming of age. Will I change once I'm a man all the way? If I whack off too much am I gonna' look at you and start wanting to undress you?

Fuck, I dunno'. Weird thoughts, Ikkaku. Quit thinking about your dick already.

I'm so full of steam. I have too much energy to burn off and it makes me feel bad sometimes, because I'm old enough to realize that I shouldn't drag you around with me. You don't have a fire in your gut to give you the energy to do those things all day, all the time. When I was younger, I'd beg and beg until you played with me, but now me and you will separate sometimes and I'll meet with friends who share that fire. I like to give you a break from me. I know I try your patience a lot.

I feel my blood pumping. I'm ready for violence. I'm ready for _life_. I feel capable and old enough to do these adult things, to fight to the death. I'm not of legal age, but I want these to fight anyways. Hatachi is still years away from me, but I want to prepare.

I can't fucking sit still. I've gotta' be moving or I start itching all over. You talk much more than you used to now, and your voice is pretty much the only thing that calms me down. When I'm dying to be out there looking for another fight, you'll ask me if you ever told me the story about the boy who came out of a peach and defeated a fort of oni on a distant island. Of course I have to stay and hear. Before I know it, it'll be nightfall and I'll have made it through a day without bloodshed. I love being told stories; it can be from anyone, but yours are the best.

I don't beg you to play anymore, I'm not a kid. I got me some self-control. We play cards a lot though. You got me them for my fifteenth birthday and I've kept them nice. Cards, those are the kind of games you can stand, where you don't have to move around much and can still rest while beating me blind. You're the one who taught me gambling, and I'm not good, at least against you. Probably because you can read my face so well that you can tell when I'm bluffing. I can never read you, though. It's fucking impossible to see something on your face if you don't want it to be there.

I'm surprised how many nights you'll let me take up your time when I know you'd rather be out working and gathering more money to later feed us with. It gets harder each time for me to let you pay for me, and I've been getting enough off my opponents that I can pay for myself most of the time now. I'm glad you still make time for me anyway and will sit around a fucking campfire with a skinny teenager when there are probably smarter, more interesting people around that could take up your nights. Yeah right, smarter people, out here? Maybe it's possible, but probably not.

You teach me all the games you know, and then how to count cards, which is the real trick of poker. You're real good. I've seen you play for real in the bar before, and you tell me to go sit behind someone else, because my poker face is bad and if I look at your cards I'm gonna' give shit away, so I listen, but damn, can you play well. I wonder why you don't gamble instead of selling your body. When I ask how you got so good, you say someday you'll teach me how, and I try hard to learn. You tell me if you remember where the cards are, the cards of others, who has what, what's been played and add them up in your head, you can start to eliminate and guess what people will draw and what it's likely that they have in their hand. You can start to not completely rely on luck, and have an advantage. You tell me that poker is a game that gives intelligence the advantage, but every so often, someone with crap skills can still win through sheer luck, which is why people loves the game. Everyone thinks poker is purely a game of luck and odds, and you like to keep it that way, because it draws in more suckers.

Maybe I'm like that with fighting too. If a guy thinks that just because he's bigger and stronger than me, that he'll win, that it's a predetermined fact of nature, it's a lot easier for me to beat him, cause' he'll let his guard down. My skill, I want my skills to become so great that it won't matter how strong my opponent is.

I fucking love winning. I'm the best around. I brag to you about beating someone when I'd been out with my friends and you weren't there to see it. I talk a lot of shit, and I wonder why you tolerate me yacking in your ear, because it's not like you talk about _your_ day endlessly to me. No, you don't tell me to give it a rest, you just turn to me and look in my eyes and say 'did I ever tell you the one about the rabbit in the moon?' The story still doesn't make sense to me, but I like listening anyway. Still I wonder, why would he jump in the fire?

I don't know when it struck me over my endless hours pondering how close I am to adulthood, but what will happen when I reach that? What'll happen when I grow up? I'm sure that it's not this sudden thing, since we age at the same rate our whole lives, but it's a state of mind, and I'm sure it'll occur to you too. What will happen when I grow up? Will you suddenly realize that we've been together too long and decide that it's time for you to move on? Will you tell me one day that I can't sleep in bed with you, will you turn to me and tell me I'm too old for this? That I have to make my own life?

I don't… I don't _feel_ like I'm a tag-along, but maybe that's how you still see me, that kid still following behind you.

I wonder if when I'm officially an adult, when I'm all the way grown, you'll send me off on my own. Would I want to go? I don't think so. It's not that I'm fixed on staying, or against leaving, it's just that I'm here with you and you're here with me and we have a good friendship, and why break that? I feel like maintaining that. It's not that I'm the one who is like 'I'll hang around and see what happens'. You're not thinking that either, probably. We just do shit.

I don't have future plans really, and I don't think you do either. We've got nowhere in particular to be or go, so why not stick together? Why change? I can't even fathom our friendship ending. Literally, it's not even something that I fear will happen, I just can't imagine it happening. We're parts of each other.

Yeah, this isn't temporary. When I grow up, I'm not suddenly gonna' wanna' walk some other way and you're not gonna' do that either. I'm sure we'll stick together for a good long time. I'm gonna' make sure that you know me as an adult for a lot longer than you knew me as a kid. You'll think of me as a man when my name comes to your mind, not the kid you saw grow up.

Damn, you're so pretty. I feel like I notice more now that I'm older. Of course, I don't want to… to _stick it in_ or anything, but I can definitely appreciate your beauty more, especially now that I can fully understand what it means for you to be the prettiest one out here. That takes resilience. That takes _guts._ Beauty that survives out here has to be strength. God, you're pretty, Yumichika. How do you do it?

Your hair especially. I'm not a kid anymore and I should have impulse control, but sometimes when you're not paying attention and I'm sure you can't see, I'll touch just a little. You probably can't even feel it when I do it. I know you don't like those other men touching your hair, but you let them. I won't treat ya' like them. I can be gentle. I'll never yank.

Even if you hate those guys you go to bed with, I think that you must want to be touched. I want to give you friendly touch so that maybe you'll be satisfied with that and not look for others. I hope it feels different with me than it does with them. It's different, because they don't love you.

You and I bought me a sword when I turned fourteen, a _quality_ sword. Oh my god, I don't think I'd ever been happier about something in my life. When I first held that thing in my hands, I just knew this was the key, this was the thing that would unlock so many doors, so many ways for me to become stronger. It was… It was so beautiful. The blade was so sharp, and I still haven't had to sharpen it even once. I had my sword then, and you picked one off of a dead man for yourself. Times were great.

You talk and talk to me today - god, how I love to fuckin' gab for hours. It calms me down so much. We talk about the moon and June and fuck all else and we don't stop until we fall asleep, and then we do it again the next day. I need that. I'm so hyper, I'm so pent-up and full of energy that I can hardly hold still. There's a fire in my blood. I have to find something more to this life. I want to kill, I want to win, I want you to see me succeed. Your voice grounds me, your stories slow down my brain and give me something productive to think about. You're soothing, an anchor, and you smile so much now. You smile at me like I'm a shining star, and I can't look away. I have to keep burning bright and stay worthy of your approval, I have to give you a reason to keep smiling.

I couldn't bear it if I grew up to become a man, only to see that you've found that I'm just like the rest of them. I have to be something better, and I will be. I'll make something of myself, I promise.

The first time I deliberately killed someone in battle, I was sixteen. The fight felt good, but it didn't feel good when I put the point of my sword against his chest and thrust it in and he abruptly dropped. It took me right back to the night I knifed that guy in the back when he picked you up and threw you down like you were nothing.

That time, killing someone in a real battle, I didn't lay awake traumatized for days like I did the first time, but it sure didn't feel good remembering how I could feel the resistance of the skin and bone and meat against my blade, or the heavy pressure I'd had to use to stab… That sure didn't feel good, seeing him so surprised, seeing his eyes go dark so fast.

No one can tell me that the dead look peaceful.

We battle a lot, you and I against each other, and I enjoy this. I hold back, and I hate holding back normally, because if I hold back I cannot improve, but with you it's okay. I don't want to fight you until either of us is so hurt that we can't stand, I don't want to fight you to the death. I like our wins and losses against each other to be equal, so I only fight you for fun, a different kind of fun than the others. It makes me really happy to fight with you. Fight doesn't even sound like the right word, because that makes it sound vicious and serious and mean. It's not like that at all. It's so different from how it is with my real opponents.

I wonder if it's like that for you and the men you sleep with. All men are the same to you, but I'm a different kind of man in your eyes. I mean, aren't I? I understand that I've gotten big now, that I'm strong and I could hurt you. I could hurt you, but I won't ever fucking do that. I'll never hurt you, Yumichika. You know that, right? You know that.

I meet a girl.

She laughs like bells and I have to chase her, because she runs. When I slow down and almost let her get away, she stops and turns to look at me and laughs some more, and I start chasing again. The women around here don't wanna' be caught. They always run, because if they're caught, they get messed up. This girl doesn't run like she wants to get away, and when I finally nab her, she doesn't scream. It surprises me that she doesn't try to escape. What do I do now? I caught her.

Maybe now it's time to let go.

I loosen my grip, but she doesn't worm her wrist out of my hand or scream for help. I must look young enough that she's not too scared. I think she's my age. Her hand's so small in mine. I feel like I could break her, but I don't. I feel funny inside.

I kiss her. She's soft.

I'm so hungry for a fight. I wanna' fight so bad that I think I'll explode. I've taken to slashing at tree-trunks when we're cooling down for the evening, sitting around our fire, and getting ready for sleep. I cut the wood until there's no bark, and sometimes I see how high I can get a slice. You tell me to lay down when I get too over-zealous and send woodchips flying backwards towards your feet.

I can't, I can't lay down. I tell you that I don't wanna' go to sleep. I can't sit still, I say. I want to prowl the streets. I feel like a wolf. I need to howl and run and hunt. I want to bite into something. I want to dig my fingernails into the ground. There's a fire in my blood and I can't put it out. There will be no sleeping.

You teach me how to meditate that night, and at first it's really hard and I think it's stupid. I can't do it, and it's hard, so it must be fucking stupid. I write it off and tell you it's a pile. You just look at me blandly as I rant about how this isn't gonna' help me. I don't know what I'm supposed to be thinking about, what's the point of breathing and focusing my energy? This is _dumb_ , I tell you, trashing your idea, but without breaking your gaze, you calmly tell me that to be a skilled fighter, I must have patience and discipline. The fire that burns too hot goes out too quickly, and I need to burn slowly for a long period of time, heating up with close control. I have to balance power with control, have determination _and_ diligence, or else I'm a waste of blood, you say.

Shame boils within me, and I know you're right. Fuck.

I try hard. I don't want to see that look on your face again, like you can't believe how weak and impulsive I am that I can't sit still for longer than a minute. I hold both ends of my sword and fold my legs. I put my back straight against a tree-trunk and take a deep breath, letting my spine flatten onto the wood, then I let it out, my eyes falling closed with it.

I want to become a man. I repeat this over and over and focus on that intention. I do this every night now, and I start noticing that I'm thinking quicker in battles. I dodge something that I shouldn't have seen coming, but it had been clear to me. I can pick up more tells from the way a person stands before a battle and I'm not so clouded by excitement and adrenaline.

I'm getting better each time with every fight, I just know it.

I make some new buddies and have been hanging out every night this week with them, causing trouble, normal shit that young people do, thinking we're cool. I come home and you have a boyfriend with you. Not a playmate, but a _lover._ It's not new, but it hasn't happened in a while. I don't get a good vibe off of him, but I don't say shit, because he's got half-way decent manners at least.

I'm not gonna' give you guys my fucking blessing or anything, cause' I'm not your dad and I don't like these situations or these people, but I say something like, 'do what you want.' Maybe I say congratulations once, and we drink together. This guy isn't completely awful, I decide. He sticks around for maybe a month and I'm getting used to him.

Only problem is that you wanna' talk to him instead of me now, and it bugs me more than it did when I was younger. When I was little I'd just be openly jealous and pull your arm to make you pay me attention, and you'd tolerate it, but now I feel bad about bothering you guys. You're happy, so I go out more often with the guys. That just seems to push us apart a little more every day though.

One time I wake up holding you on one side while he's holding you on the other, and I feel fucking sick. Maybe I do need to go off on my own and leave you two be, because _this_ is just too weird. I know you're not gonna' replace me, so I don't have to cling on so tight. We can just spend a little more time apart, but that doesn't mean we're splitting up. I'm secure in that knowledge like I am with nothing else. I know that I'm not being replaced, that I have nothing to fear. I know that, so why does it hurt anyway?

This is the last real lover you ever have. He looks nice, actually. His face isn't unbearable and he makes you laugh, my _god_ , he makes you laugh. I try not to hang around or butt in when you two're talking, because I know now that you guys want private time together. When I was a kid, I was too fucking oblivious to know when to fuck off somewhere, but I get the hint now.

This is what you want, and you deserve love and happiness. Anything your heart desires, you must have, Yumichika. I _want_ you to have happiness. I never want to see you lying despondent like you were that day again.

Deep down I know it won't last, and of course, it doesn't.

I beat him absolutely senseless. I had trusted another one, _another_ one of these fucks with your heart, and he'd betrayed that. I'd let him do what he'd pleased, I'd trusted that he was a good man, but they never are. I'd hoped for your sake that he'd been different.

"Look what you got!" I scream, shaking him hard, turning him to face you. " _Look what you mother-fucking got!_ " You watch for a moment and then turn away in a daze, walking away. I knock his teeth in and tell him he's lucky that I don't kill him. What a pathetic piece of shit, what a brain-dead bastard to not realize how lucky he'd been to have you.

I'm sick of seeing you love people so hard, thinking they're different from the others, and then having them take you for granted. How could anyone be graced with your time, your laughter, and your love and not think themselves the luckiest person in the world? How can they toss you aside? What are you doing wrong? I don't understand why they all seem to think you deserve this.

Yumichika, don't look for other men. I will never do this to you. Let me be your man. I'll be the only man in your life, and you'll never feel this pain again. You can be happy, and you won't even have to sleep with me. You can be happy and not just for a little while. Let me be the only man you give notice to; I'll never let you hurt.

You spend a day sitting at a riverbank, just staring at the water. I sit with you. I don't try to talk to you. I wonder if you know I'm there.

It's silent, but all I can hear and feel is a heart so broken that its pieces could sand a beach.

Yeah. I was right about that guy just like I was about the others. I know what's best for you, and that's to avoid men altogether. Why not make friends and have them actually be _friends_ for once? Why do you look for that kind of awfulness? Surely it doesn't make you feel better for even a minute. You're messed up inside if you even hope that it will. You're messed up, but I know better. I know better and I won't let you do this to yourself.

Why? I wonder that every time I see it happen. Why are you always around men who treat you bad? Maybe I'd had this delusion when I was younger, but I'd seen you as some sort of high-class person who would've cut down anyone who disrespected him. You had dignity, I thought. You were the person who taught me not to take shit from people, but I notice now, all you do is take people's shit.

Why do you let them do it? What puzzles me even more is that I don't know how they even _could_ treat you bad. You're funny and smart and _beautiful._ Why do they seem to hate you? I still don't get why they do it, but they'll walk past you and _spit._

Now, I don't know about anyone else, but fucking _spitting_ on someone is unacceptable. That's the most low-down disrespectful thing, no matter how mad I get, no matter how much of a dick the other person is, there's gotta' be some decent human respect. I ain't so far above the human race that I could look down at someone and spit on them, not even the ground at their feet. Spit is reserved for scum, and I won't do it to anything more than scum.

But they do it to you. They think you're such garbage that they actually _spit_. They walk past you and sneer, they laugh, they call you things and try to touch you like there's an open invitation on your body, like there's something on your pretty face that tells them that you deserve to be treated horribly. What makes you different from any other guy walking around here?

Does beauty just do that to people?

If it's because you're a prostitute, then it makes even less sense for them to treat you bad. They're the ones that come to you for some lovin'. It's not like you're the only one who's laying down and doing something dirty. They don't get to act so pure, like you're the one that's messed up. They're the same men who seek you out once night falls. The fact that they're so broken down and desperate that they have to actually _pay_ someone to go to bed with them should be enough to wake them up to the fact that they're not worth anyone sleeping with them willingly, so they shouldn't be doing it at all. If they have to pay, trick someone, or drug them to 'get lucky', if they _think_ they're _'getting lucky'_ , they know damn well they don't deserve to do what they're doing.

I've heard that 'is it rape or theft' joke probably a hundred times. One thing I've learned from you about prostitutes, is that they're people. Those girls can really put liquor away, and if they know I'm not after them for that one thing, they stop with the fake laughter and treat me real sweet - in a genuine way too. Good drinking partners, those girls, and much more lovely when they wipe that paint-shit off their faces. 'Rape or theft', my ass. It depends on whether those men are seeing a person or a thing.

It's just as well, because I wouldn't even treat garbage as badly as they treat you. You're careful to not let me see most of the time, but I know. I _know_ what's happening.

When I was younger and I saw you get spanked that time, of course, I didn't really get what had happened or why he'd done it, but by seventeen, when a man spanks you, I kill him. I find him later at night when you're asleep in the grass somewhere, and I kill him. It wasn't hard. I just provoked him into a fight, and after a few rounds I socked him in the jaw so hard that his head snapped around. He was a lousy fighter. Looks like he could hit your butt, but not hit me.

You might let that shit slide, but I'm not gonna'.

When I'm not focused on fighting or on training, that's what consumes my mind. I'm becoming obsessed with the thought. I look at the men carefully now when you talk to them, and I feel funny inside. _This_ is the person who will go off with you somewhere and you two will undress and join together. Why with _that_ guy, I wonder. Is there something special about him? What gives you the strength to do it if there really isn't anything special there at all?

I don't want you to have to be strong enough to do that. I don't want you to do that ever again, but you do it again and again and again and _again_ and I can't even keep track of how many it must be. I'm always thinking about what I can do for money. You haven't stopped going to other men, and I know better now.

You lay down with men for money. It's not just kissing, and I've known for a long time. You let them see you naked and touch you _there_. You let them put it inside. You let them inside, and it doesn't matter who, as long as they can pay.

When I kill men in battle, I look over the body for money now. I always do, and I save it carefully. I offer to buy us our food, but you tell me 'no, no, you worked hard for that and you should keep it.' You think I should have spending money for alcohol or fireworks or whatever it is that young men want. A hooker, maybe. Yeah right. You don't let me buy food for you, but you'll use your hard-earned money to pay for the both of us. I bring up that point, and you say it's your money and you'll do what you want with it.

Can't you see that's the same thing? I'm not a kid who needs pocket-money. I'm trying to help you, and not out of obligation. Let me help you out of this bad situation, damnit.

I start to realize that I can hold out my hand to pull you out of the pit all I want, but you're the one that has to grab on. That makes me feel frustrated and fucking helpless, and it drives me mad. I'm gonna' find a way to force you to grab on. I won't _let_ you keep doing this.

When I got called names as a kid, you never told me 'they're wrong.' You never told me that what they said wasn't true, you never told me that I wasn't what those kids used to call me. You never told me they were wrong, but that's what you taught me, to _prove_ them wrong.

' _Bitch, slut, pretty-boy, twink, fag, cum-dump, harlot, whore, whore, whore.'_ I could go on. I've always had a foul mouth, but I quickly learned which words you were not going to let me say near you, even if I was talking about other people. I learned how to refer to a woman the right way, I learned how to insult girls without crossing that line of respect, I learned how to have a foul but acceptable mouth around you, and when I hear those words from other people, aimed at you, it sends off this explosion in my chest, this high-pitched scream in my brain, because it's so inherently wrong. You aren't those things, Yumichika. 'Whore' isn't your _name._ You told me from the beginning that you weren't those things and that I wasn't allowed to call you that or even say the words while you could hear. You aren't those things, and I don't wanna' hear other people calling you that either. That's not your name. That's not what you are.

You taught me to prove my bullies wrong, but why won't you do that for yourself?

With me, you were just correcting me, because you knew I didn't really think you were those things when I said those words, and I learned real fast that you were right, that wasn't what I meant. But with them, they _mean_ it. They mean it, and someone should set them straight. _You_ should set them straight.

You ain't no whore, Yumichika, you aren't cheap. You're worth more and you deserve _better._ You're the most beautiful person in the world and you deserve to be treated like it. Don't do this to yourself.

You're the one who taught me self-respect, but you don't practice what you preach when it's _you_. When it's concerning yourself, you just take it, you just accept it and put up with it. How long are you gonna' let this go on?

Well, _I'm_ not gonna' let it go on.

I learn right away not to interfere directly, and you admit to me what you do. There's a difference between being positive that I know something and having it confirmed. I know for sure now, and it just makes me feel sick. I can't believe I'm not allowed to kill them, that you're just gonna' spread your legs and that I have to know that you're doing it. I don't have to hear or see, but I still know that you're doing it and I want to throw up.

Why don't you fight these circumstances harder? You taught me not to lie down and take it when someone's messing with me, but that's exactly what you do. You lie down and take it - oh fuck, I'm gonna' hurl. Yumichika, please, please come away with me and see that the world can be beautiful. That's what you taught me. You taught me that life can be more, and I want you to have more. I want you to have so much fucking more than a hooker's life. You have to want it too. Why don't you? I don't get why you don't want it bad enough to save yourself. Fight, _please!_

I get that it's a long-held habit, something you probably resolved yourself to doing and that your mind probably doesn't let you see a way out of it anymore, but there _are_ ways out. I know so. I know better and I have to make you see that.

I think about other ways - other ways that we could make enough money for us to eat, but you don't want to listen to that. You just want to continue as you are, even though it's been tearing you apart for years. Maybe you're addicted to that. Maybe you can't stop. I'm not one of those idiots who think people secretly enjoy rape, but I feel like part of you wants to keep going back one more time. Just maybe, you can't stop, maybe you feel fulfilled for a minute but it goes cold once it's over. Maybe.

You're right, though. It's not my decision, and I can't control anyone's decisions but my own. I try, but I can't in the end. You act differently around me now, and I can see that you're ashamed that I know.

Yumichika, you could roll in this filth for eternity. I don't think you're dirty. You just do dirty things. You can stop whenever you want to. You can wash off the outside and be the person you are inside, the person who doesn't actually want to do these things. I don't think you're dirty.

It's just… I thought you were better than that.

Maybe that's what adult life is like. Maybe it's something I should just give in to as an inevitability. Maybe sexuality is just a part of human nature, maybe this impulse is what keeps animals like us alive. Maybe I should accept that love is just chemical sabotage that ensures that offspring will survive. Love wasn't real, love was never real.

Fuck that. If it's not real, why do I feel so awful inside when I see you in pain? Yumichika, I would kill them. I would kill them for you and you could take their money before having to lay down with them. I would do it, if only you would ask, if only you would let me. I would slay the world.

I don't understand, and I'm glad I'm not the young boy who thinks that you'll protect me if I make myself really small behind you. I can stand and protect myself, and I could protect you too, maybe. I can stand up and not take backtalk if I don't want to. You taught me that. You taught me not to lay down and show my belly, not to take other people's shit. You taught me to stand up for myself, but here you are just giving up, and that, I will never understand.

I slowly realize that you've resigned yourself to this. You're not going to change. I can't force you to, and I won't try to anymore. The only thing to do is accept your decision, although I don't agree or respect that decision. I try not to pay attention. I keep quiet when it happens, when you take his hand and disappear out the door or into an alley. I keep quiet when you come back, whenever I see you handling money, but it still stings.

God, does it sting.

My sword could level a city. I hold it in my hands, and my blood pumps. I grin and lick my teeth. This guy's big. It looks promising, and he's only a little drunk. I get my ass handed to me pretty bad, mostly because of his sheer size and weight. It goes on for almost ten minutes, and ends with me ducking a swipe by bending my spine back impossibly far and then rebounding to cut his belly open. I had a speed advantage and it had only taken that one second to end it. The ground shakes when his knees go down, then he teeters and crashes forward.

That had been fun. I stand there and heave with laughter and exhaustion for a moment, before my heart starts slowing down and my brain catches up on my injuries. The pain blasts through me all at once and damn, I really got fucked up, didn't I?

You take care of me the next day when my wounds are infected and aching like crazy. I swear no one can cook rice like you do. It's so fucking fluffy and light, but it still sticks together. You're such a comfort to me when I've got nothing else.

I'm so stiff the next day that I can't move my leg. It takes you a couple hours to get hot water, but you do get it and it helps a lot on my joints and soothes the cut and the yellow shit that's coming out of it. Geez, that can't be good. I have to bite something when you tell me you've gotta' get rid of that, and you take my sword and cut off the scab and squeeze the wound to get all that bad crap out, washing it well and then wrapping it really good this time.

"God damn," I pant as I finally flop back when you're done. Fuck, that had hurt so bad, but that fight was still worth it. I grin tiredly when you move next to me and place your hand between the shoulder-blades and pat me. It vaguely registers in the aware-part of my brain that you're actually touching me. I'm still shuddering in pain and my leg feels like it's on fire. I feel woozy. You scratch my neck a couple times comfortingly and move in to peck the back of my head and tell me you're glad that I fight so well, and I'm sure I flush as red as a fucking tomato. "Aw, fuck off," I mumble, but I'm probably smiling like a fool. You just laugh once in response.

Even if I'm fucked up for a month after a bad fight, I'm proud of the win, because you never say 'this is too dangerous. You have to stop doing this to yourself.' No, you're happy for my victory too, no matter how much I pay for it. What doesn't kill me makes me stronger, and I'm glad you know that too.

I find myself with less respect for the weak. If they tried harder, they'd be like me. I know I have to build more discipline still, but I know that I'm better than them now. I can't help from smiling when I fight, because I know that I'm going to win.

I don't respect the weak, but I still have respect for you. Even though I know you won't fight your circumstances hard enough to break free, I still respect that it's your decision. You resolved yourself to something horrible and stuck by it, and that took grit, even if it was misplaced grit. You're not who I thought you were, but you still have a place in my heart. You're not weak, you're anything but weak to bear through that kind of shit. You're tough.

One day I wake up and I'm taller than you. I just am, and I don't remember being that way yesterday, but I definitely am. I feel uncomfortable and weird in my stomach, because I know that I'm going to keep growing. I've known for a long time that I'm going to get bigger than you, and I don't know how I feel about it. I don't want to think that you're weaker or smaller, because I don't have respect for the weak.

No, you're not weaker, I'm just stronger. There's a difference, at least to me there is.

This time the fight is brutal and is over quickly. I got a dagger stuck between my ribs and he ends up with a broken neck and a big cut in his stomach. I see a liver in there, which is amazing considering how much he obviously drank.

You pull the knife out of me later, quick and efficient, and the stab wound is deep. You clean that and tell me I need a stitch or two, so as I ball up a scrap of cloth and hold the cut, I walk with you into town and we knock on doors, looking for someone who will lend a needle and thread.

You let the needle sit in alcohol for about ten minutes and then sew me together. The part that hurt especially bad wasn't the piercing of the needle, but the thread being dragged through my flesh when you pulled the stitches tight. That gets infected overnight, inflamed, red, and angry, and I can hardly lift my arm because it tugs on the wound. We keep pouring alcohol on it every few hours, and my side is always sticky. This one takes less time to heal. Maybe a little under a month, but it heals well. It drove me nuts to have to rest for that long, but that's what I get for letting myself get knifed. I'm ready to fight again, and this time I won't let that happen.

I wonder what it's like to have sex with a woman. I think about that a lot now. I mean, what do they _look_ like? I know what breasts look like, and I know what's down there too, but I haven't seen it close enough to really tell for sure or have a clear picture. I'm imagining a plain line, just a slit right there, but that can't be all there is to it, right? I know how sex works, of course - the guy goes inside - but I don't know what the woman actually looks like there. I'd like to see one day, maybe. I wonder what it's like to have sex with a woman, I wonder how it feels.

From what I've gathered, there are two kinds of girls out here – ones who resist without fail, and ones who agree without fail.

They call you the same thing that they call those girls who always agree.

I wonder if sex makes people hateful, if they stop thinking it's this special thing. That's probably why these guys hit and curse at the same women who warm their beds at night. It's probably not special at all. Maybe I'm playing it up too much, because I wonder a lot how it's like. I wonder what a woman looks like naked, that mysterious v-shape that comes down from both hips and between their legs that seems to be _nothing_ from a distance. It looks flat, like nothing's there. I wonder how they pee. It's a strange thought, I know that, but it drives me nuts to wonder.

I wonder how it's like to see one naked, how it's like to lay down with a woman. How is it like to touch her breast, how is it to put it inside? I wonder, but I don't particularly want to do it. I wonder, I keep wondering and it consumes my thoughts. What is it about this thing of theirs that turns boys into bad men, men who drool and slobber and jeer, men who will kiss their mothers but go out and treat other women so badly? What turns these guys into animals, what makes them so hungry at night that they can't function without a girl in their arms? It's probably not this thing that a girl has at all, but the guys being bad inside all on their own.

I'm probably old enough to make a child, aren't I? It's weird to think of, but I guess I'm old enough to make a baby. I could have sex, probably, if I wanted, but I don't think I'm missing much. No, I'm not missing out on a damn thing, not when I think of how bereft you always are, you _always_ are, when you come back after a roll in the hay. You come back from having gone to bed with someone, and your eyes are dead.

I wonder if any of my friends have lain down with you.

You've taken me to brothels by now, my fair share of bars, and you tell me to have my fun, but that if I make a girl pregnant, I must take responsibility and consequently my fighting days will be over. I take that to heart like you wouldn't believe.

My friends keep encouraging me, and I listen on to their stories, but my interest isn't piqued. Maybe you want to tease me about it, or maybe you think I'm just too shy to ask a girl to come to bed with me, so you extend advice. It's absolutely mortifying to hear you tell me how to pleasure a partner, and I always shout at the top of my lungs and plug my ears like I'm eight. I say that sounds horrible and that I don't want it. You smile and tell me that I won't always feel that way, that I'm growing up and that I'll feel differently soon. The thing is, I already _feel_ grown up. I feel like I already _have_ grown up, and I don't want this thing that they talk about. Don't you see that? I'm already an adult and I still don't want it, and I don't know if I ever will 'grow up' and suddenly want it.

I'm close enough to being a man that I might as well be one, and I still don't feel that thing. I don't feel this thing that they talk about. When they look at girls when they're hanging out with me, I feel like they see some other creature than I'm seeing. I just see a young woman, but they see ultraviolet arrows or something, like bees and flowers. Maybe. I don't know why they drool like that. I don't see the appeal of slobbering on someone else's face, of touching tongues or biting someone's ear or putting hands inside their underwear. I don't think it's gross or weird, I just don't feel the impulse or motivation to do something like that. I just wanna' drink and play cards. Some of my friends stay, some of them go on their woman-hunt like men possessed.

I don't want to look for others. If I had a thousand friends, I wouldn't be able to be close to any. I'd rather just have one. I don't want to look for others. I don't want _you_ to look for others. I want to be with you, and I want you to be with me, like when I was younger.

My friends say it's important that I lose my virginity, and it gets so annoying that I think about lying to them just to get them off my case. They say it's a test of my manliness, to see if I could get a woman, that a male virgin has failed in life, that I can't die a virgin or else what was my life for? That's such a pile, and I tell them so.

You said there's no whores, no prudes, and there can be no virgins either. There's no such thing and I see that now. How on earth does a dick know whether it's cumming because of a hand or a woman's body around it? It _doesn't_. Same with girls, how does their body know the difference between fingers and a man's body inside? How would the skin know if anything had been inside at all or if it was just the opposite wall touching against it? The body doesn't know. There's no such thing as virginity, no biological basis for it. It's something that was made up by people to distinguish pure and dirty, to make people feel guilty, just like you said. It's just another way of people trying to control others with words, and I feel like I might be one of those people you were talking about when you first taught me about sex.

There's people who do what they want in bed, people who resist and keep their desires secret, and people who just don't care, who just don't feel it. I think that's me. What I care about is good beer and good fights. Maybe cool coin tricks. Nice fireworks in the distance. Flower-smells. Pork-ribs.

I want to grow up all the way, _officially_ , so I can prove to you that I'm not gonna' change, that I won't ever turn into that kind of man, that not all men have to be bad men. I won't be one of them. On my honor, I won't be one of those men who's skirt-chasin' after you. I have to hurry and become a man, so I can show you that you can still look in my eyes and see someone you once knew. I won't become like them.

I take up drinking. I've only gotten wrecked once or twice, because I really learned my lesson when I was puking up my guts while I was out with my buddies. No one wants to be that guy, but it was all of us at least once. I learn to hold my liquor, and the most important thing I learn is when to say, 'no, that was the last shot. I'm done.' See, I don't wanna' be unable to fight if we're at the bar, so there's a fine line of how much I can knock back before it starts really going to my blood and my brain. There's all sorts of thugs that hang out at the bar, and I don't wanna' miss my chance because I'm too wasted. I don't wanna' miss my chance.

'Come on', they say, because there's a gangbang going on and this could be my chance to get laid. They tell me to just come on, it'll be quick, and I'll like it.

"Nah, I'm busy", I say. I'm playing poker with a stranger, and I'm trying to count those damn cards. When I beat him and he gets mad, thinking I cheated, I wanna' be ready to fight. I'm not wasting time with my clothes around my feet. "I'll see you guys later, okay?" I say, and they shrug. I hear 'he'll never change', and I grin a little. Damn straight.

Nah, I'm not interested in that shit. I see that sex isn't special. It's not something really great that you do with someone you love, and if it's not, then I don't care for it. It's not for love, ever, at least not out here. I'm a one on one guy, and I wouldn't be happy to do it with someone one time and then never see them again or have to share them. Screw that. No, sex isn't special, it's something that feeds, but leaves the recipient hungrier every time. It's something that calms, but leaves the user restless. It's something that sedates and leaves the participants frenetic. It's something that drains, it takes away; it's unfulfilling and addictive. It makes them think they're getting something, that they've gained something every time they get a new girl in their arms, but they lose more and more, they need, and no one should ever need like that. They're left desperate every night. High-risk loveless sex drains the spirit over time.

You are proof of that.

I've gotta' get stronger. I'm not good enough yet. I'm nowhere near as strong as I wanna' be yet. I've gotta' keep getting better. I've improved so much, but I've gotta' keep getting better.

This fight is hot and heavy. I'm working hand over fist for every moment of breath. I'm bleeding all over and I think I might actually die for a minute, but I know I won't die before I beat him. I'm gonna' win, on my honor. When am I going to get enough of this?

God, I don't _want_ enough. I don't want to stop, not ever. I want to be strong enough to slay this awful world.

I fall to one knee, my foot having slipped in a pool of his friend's blood. There had been about ten, but now there's three. Big, ugly, and stupid. Big guy's got a ring on his hand, learned that the hard way when my cheek split from a punch. Ugly's fast, but hesitates too much, and his guts are coming out. Stupid's a lost cause, but he keeps getting up.

I messed up my back from that last hit, and I'm getting fucked up pretty bad. God, I feel alive. This is what I live for, this feeling of weightlessness, elation, living only because of my own capability. I could slip up and be killed, but I won't, because I have that power.

You're off to the side watching, aren't you, somewhere on the edge of the carnage and the field of bodies and the blood soaking the street. You're back there watching, so I can't lose. I won't lose. I've seen at least one of these guys with you before, and it made killing them that much sweeter.

Ugly's lost too much blood now, and the big guy finally gets me and I hear my shoulder pop and my arm drops uselessly - it's not moving. That's not good.

You scream for me back there, and I can't take it right now. Shut up and let me focus. I don't want you to worry about me. It's the first time you've ever done that out loud, that you've ever doubted that I would win. I didn't want you to show fear, because when you do, there's reason to be afraid, and I don't wanna' know that. Keep that inside, Yumichika. I don't want you to break.

"I don't want your help."

Don't worry about me, don't fear for my life. That's an insult, that stings so much when I've come this far. Don't you think I can beat them, Yumichika? You don't have to come to my rescue anymore, and I won't let you. I'll become strong and I won't let you help anymore. Don't interfere. Don't you dare interfere ever again. You'd better respect that. If I can watch you walk off in the arms of a sicko, you can watch me do this. If you can't stop yourself, if you really can't keep quiet, why don't you just go away for a while? Just _go._

We don't talk for a week.

There's wild dogs running around the town, and I see one of them with a hand in its mouth. There's some boys that can't be more than thirteen who are fastening their belts and running past me. I'm wandering the woods on my own now, kicking a dog that snapped at me a little too close to get out of my fucking face. They're around my legs and they're fighting over something in the difference. I don't have to get close to know what it is, and I move on. I hop a stream and come to the edge of the wilderness.

It's barren desert as far as I can see, so I turn back and keep going through the sparse trees until I find a few patches of grass. Something smells rancid, and I hear low buzzing noises. I come around a bend and there's a dead girl on the ground, and she's naked and on her back, legs spread open. Who knows how many times her killers came back for her body, but she was starting to seriously rot now. There's cum on the ground, I can smell it; someone's been coming here to whack off. She had been pretty in life, but maggots are eating away at one eyesocket, and they're coming out of that place that I never got to see up close before.

I stop dead and stare. I blink and I try to look away, but the image is burning itself into my eyeballs and I can't stop turning back around to take another look. It reminds me of that dream I had a few years ago. I keep trying to walk away, but I can't stop turning back to look at her again and soon it's absolutely branded in my brain.

I throw up. I stumble away and I throw up again.

She'd been a prostitute, surely. I'd seen the white paint on the high spots of her face, meant to catch the glow of the moon at night and make her appear more lovely. She'd probably been out working and some men had taken her away and killed her. I think of you like that, lying dead in the woods, your corpse still a warm place for people to come back and stick it in until you're too rotten to be enjoyed. I think of you like this girl. It could happen one day. As long as you keep doing this, that possibility will always be there.

'It's my decision,' you said.

I think of that endlessly. When I try to sleep, her body is there, even if I keep my eyes open. How easily it could be you. End up with the wrong guy and you turn up dead. End up with the wrong guy and they're raping you and they won't pay, and it was all for nothing. End up with the wrong guy and they take you away and kill you. You won't be buried, never, you'll just lay there and they'll keep coming back to look at you and jerk off. When I close my eyes and try to rest, her body is there in my mind. I think of it still, even though it's your decision to put yourself at that risk, in that danger. It's your decision to do those things.

My sword is crossed with another blade and there's blood in my eyes. This is _my_ decision, Yumichika. Fighting.

I will fight for myself, and I will fight _alone._ I don't want to fight with you or against you anymore. This is my decision. You taught me that resolve.

I don't touch you anymore. Touching isn't special to you like it was with my mom. No, it doesn't mean anything to you if you can do it with strangers, so I stopped a while ago. I feel like it hurts you almost, saps your energy. You'll look so tired and grey, dark circles on your face when you come back from a long night alone, and I'll be careful not to touch you in bed at all, because you look like you feel awful. You sleep with other people, and you come back looking like you've aged a thousand years. I won't add to your burden.

I fucking hate those shinigami bastards. I've got reiatsu – I learned that's what it's called – but I'll never fucking go to Seireitei and be one of them. I hate them so damn much, but I won't fight them. I'd die too easy, even I know that, and you didn't raise me to die an easy meaningless death.

I can feel my power growing. My reiatsu concentration has increased and it's getting really thick. It gets better every time I meditate. I feel powerful. I'm nineteen, and I'm so close to being a man. Just a few more months.

You and I still walk side by side, but you don't look me in the eye. I have to prompt you more often into speaking. Have I hurt you? What's your problem? Maybe you've finally gotten tired of my attitude, but there's not much I can do about it. This is who I am, and I'm not gonna' change. I've got my dream, and I'm gonna' reach it.

I know you're much older than me than you'd initially seemed. Maybe even a hundred years older. I guess it doesn't matter, but however much it is, it puts a big gap between us, and that makes it seem not so big at all, if that makes sense. Almost like there was only so far away you could be from me in age, which was why you've always treated me like a man. Maybe that's why I've always felt like one with you.

Maybe it would've been different if you'd known me when I was five or so, if you'd seen me _really_ young, but at the time we'd met, you never really treated me like a kid. You indulged me sure, but you never did make me feel like your little brother.

Well I'm all grown up. I'm a man now. I feel like a man, even though I'm still not yet twenty. I really grew up, didn't I, under your care and guidance. You weren't the best guardian, since you didn't do any guarding or real comforting, but I learned so damn much from you.

I learned that anything worth having, I've gotta' get and do myself, and if I don't do it right the first time, I've gotta' try again and hope for better. I learned that I have to expect the best from myself and not accept anything else in order to improve. I learned what unrealistic expectations were. I became a man around you, through those years, a little at a time.

You're the reason I figured out how to make the right kind of friends, because I learned how to stand up to people's shit and actually believe it when I thought I deserved better than to be treated like a freak.

Most of all, I learned from you that damn near nothing is free, not even loving.

I get it, why you treat me differently from yourself. You didn't want me to grow up and become like you. You wanted me to stand tall when I became a man. You wanted me to look ahead, not at my feet. You wanted me to be certain of myself. Well, I will be.

You have sex because you're afraid to die, well, I'm not. You look for love because you're afraid to be alone, well, I'm not. You let people call you those things, because you believe them, well, I fucking don't.

You raised me to be confident, to not need you. I grew up independent. You raised me to fix my own problems, and I grew up analytical. You raised me to have control and determination, a handle on myself, and I fucking will. I promise I won't ask you for help. I don't know the answers, but I don't ask anymore. I won't, no matter what. I'll figure it out on my own.

I won't be like you. I won't make your efforts go to waste. I'll be who you raised me to be. I promise. I will get stronger, so strong that you won't recognize me.

I won't do this for your approval; I'll do it for me. That's what you wanted all along, was for me to be the best I could, and I will. I'll fight and think only of the enjoyment, only of winning and being stronger each time, and afterwards, you always tell me how I did, if I did better than the last. It feels good to see the bittersweet pride in your eyes.

No, I won't be like you. I'm not gonna' look back like you did. I'm heading forward and I won't falter. That's who I am, because of you. That's who you built with the first brick, and I'm never gonna' stop building this house. This is where I'll live for the rest of my life, and the walls are gonna' be strong. I won't be like you. I won't be like you, I won't let you down, I promise.

I raise my sword and I grin. I'm not afraid to die.


	3. Chapter 3

There's no more of me struggling to grow up faster. I've grown up – I think I've been an adult since fifteen. I think killing does that to a person. I was still a dumb fuck at that age, but lots of older people are too.

I'm a man. It's strange to think that way, because I don't feel like my mind ever made this snap-lightning shift, but yeah, I'm a man. Grown-ass man. I'm here at this place that I've waited to come to for ages, and it's not as great as I thought it'd be. I've wanted to be a man for so long, but it doesn't feel like I thought it would. I'm the person I want to be, but that doesn't make my life sunshine and rosie fucks.

I feel tough, I feel strong, I feel _capable,_ but god, I've got too much energy, just like I did when I was a kid. I'm not gonna' bug the fuck outta' you asking to play and shit anymore, though. Nah, I wanna' fight. I wanna' fight all the damn time. I've got too much steam to blow off, too much potential going to waste. I'm all grown up and have been for a long time, I'm strong like I always wanted to be, I'm on my own two feet, but _fuck_ , am I bored.

I don't talk much between battles when we're walking anymore, cause I don't got anything to say really, other than a heart full of hate at this fucking place and frustration at the weak men here. With me not talking and you not talking, it's pretty damn quiet between us.

I'm not a little kid anymore, and I can see that being an adult doesn't mean knowing everything, it doesn't mean _you_ knew everything, but at the time, you sure made me feel like you did, and I'm glad you did that. A kid shouldn't grow up in fear. You didn't know the answers, you knew jack shit what to do about me most of the time. You just did the best you could with what you had and the situation you were in. It was fucked up and it still is, but I'm not messing in your life anymore. I'm not a young guy who thinks he can be a hero for you. These are your demons to overcome and nothing and no one can save you from them but you. Pisses me off, but that's it.

You didn't know everything, you never did. I know better now. There's a twist in your brain that makes you honestly think you're right, that your rationale is right, and that makes it okay to you. You're crooked and you believe these crooked things that you're telling yourself, but you're _not_ right. You're not right about so many things, these things that you believe with all your heart, so many things that it's fucking ridiculous, but I'm not about to beat sense into you. I'm not laying one fucking finger on you. It wouldn't accomplish nothing. That'd just prove me to be another one of those assholes that you need to get away from.

I dunno' why you're even still here. I've grown up, right? So shoo. You did all you could for me an' you don't have to hang around from some sense of sick masochistic obligation. You know that you can't interfere in my battles, so it's not because you're thinking you want to save me one day or something. Why don't you just fuck off somewhere? Why don't you go, Yumichika? I know it fucks you up to watch me get beat on, so why stick around and view the wreckage?

I walk in front of you now, and each day you could decide to just stop following, but I never know if that day has come until the end of the night when we make camp and it turns out you were there all along. When we travel, I never look back. I don't look back like you did at me. I'm proud. This is the man I've become.

A doubtless warrior.

I wonder why you follow back there. Why don't you leave if you're not gonna' be at my side? Why do you bother? I'm walking in front of you all the fucking time, every damn day. Why don't you walk next to me anymore?

Alright, I won't fucking kid myself. You don't feel equal to me, and I guess I don't feel equal to you either. I know I've surpassed you in strength by a lot, but I'm sure you could catch up. It's only because I'm always fighting the good ones myself and leaving the small chewy fucks for you if you even feel like fighting. I've surpassed you, but you could catch up if you tried. I'd help you out, Yumichika. Don't just fall behind like that. Don't feel like I don't care. I know you hear me shit-talking the scrawny ones that beg for their lives, but don't you _know?_ Don't you know that I still would let you walk next to me as my comrade?

That shit seems obvious, so I don't say it out loud. You already know, for sure. You _have_ to. You must know, why wouldn't you? It must be for some other shit-reason. Whatever. Do what you want.

I didn't remember how quiet you were when I was younger until I hear the silence again. One day you just went quiet in the middle of a sentence and just stopped there and didn't start again. I'm listening, though. I've told you that before, I shouldn't need to remind you again, right? Maybe you just don't feel like talking anymore, I get it. It's fine. You didn't feel like it when I was younger either.

Still, that shit makes me restless like you wouldn't believe. I'm itching for a good fight, but you could calm that right down if you wanted to. Tell me about Momotarou again, c'mon, one more time.

You're a sad guy, aren't you? Not sad-pathetic, but sad- _depressed_. At times you seemed okay in the past, but looking back, I can tell it was an act. You're fighting something. You've got some serious shit to work through, and it's obviously been there in your head for a long time, longer than you've known me. Your head's fucked up. You're a tortured soul that somehow didn't become a hollow. Maybe I'm like that too.

Maybe I was like that, but you taught me self-control, you taught me how to deal with my emotions and my fits of rage, you taught me how to channel my tears and shame into something else, into something _productive_ like violence, like passion and a drive to win and to prove something. You taught me distractions, coping mechanisms, but did it ever really take my pain away?

Maybe you're like that too.

I dunno' if I'm happy either anymore. I was when I was younger, I'm sure of that. You were my whole world, you pretty fuck. You were a shining star, but as I grew up, I realized that that star was just the reflection of the cold moon off of dark turbulent waves.

Nah, I'm not happy with my life. I'm on an endless journey, and I get little bits of freedom every time I'm fighting for my life, through slick and greasy. I can't see an answer yet. I just want a bigger badder fight, and it'll come to me. The answer will come. How can I be happy in a place like this with a person like you with a dream like I have? You submit, you settle for this, you lay on your back and show your belly to these circumstances you were born in, but not me. I will never be satisfied as long as we're like this.

I will never be satisfied with the life we live.

Don't fucking back-talk me or try to change my mind. Get out of my face, get out of my head, _get your noise out of my ears._ I don't wanna' fucking hear what you think. I'm doing this regardless. I've decided and that's it. I don't wanna' hear 'are you sure about this' - of _course_ I'm fucking sure. I decided, didn't I? That's _it._ That's what you showed me about decisions and that's what I believe too. You wanted me to have conviction, and I do. So get out of my fucking face.

Sheesh... I need another fight before I bite off your head. You don't need me snapping at you. You've got every man in the world snappin' at your pretty heels, but that's not gonna' be me too.

Fine, we'll rest a little. I'm sure you're tired by now. The sun's almost down. I make a fire, and there you are, finally sitting down where I can see you. I've been in front of you all day, but now you catch up. Now that I'm finally holding still for a minute to do something, you move where I can see you. You smile a little. It doesn't go to your eyes. I still like to look at your face. You're the only nice thing to look at in this whole place.

I gotta' go stretch my legs, never mind that I've been walking all day. I need to be bone-tired to be able to relax, and I still have so much energy. I gotta' burn this off. I want sake and pork, and I'm gonna' go get it right now. That should be interesting enough.

"I'll be back. I'm getting us meat tonight," I say. You get up again, and I just look at you. I want you to rest your ankles, I want you to stay here where there are no other men, but I don't say anything.

"I'll come too."

"I don't want ya' to come," I say immediately, staring you down, and I mean it. "I'll be right back. Just gotta' bully a shop-keep."

Your face tenses up like you hurt yourself, but I just turn and go. I'm not discussing this with you. I know you're following anyway. Damnit, just rest for a while. I can't sit still, but that doesn't mean you have to share my curse.

We have a fun night like we used to for once. It's nice. We play a buncha' card games and then pass out around three o' clock. I miss doing shit like that with you, but I don't offer. If you're up for it, you'll offer on your own.

Next day's much of the same. God, I fucking hate this place. It's so damn ugly out here. Why do those fucking soldiers even bother coming out here to patrol for hollows? They come out here to wreck shops and rape women and help themselves to booze, and they think they're entitled to do it because they killed a couple of monsters that were a little bigger than the monsters they already are. If they really wanted to be helpful, they'd just burn the place down and start over fresh with nice houses like in district one.

Anything other than showing up and slaughtering people to 'balance' out with the souls in the living world. Saving those souls and bringing them here, just to kill them again and send them back… it's fucking insane. I'll never be like them. There's not a man in the world t'could convince me otherwise.

I consider it once when I hear that their swords share a piece of their soul, and that they can get more powerful by synchronizing. I'm sure I have the discipline for something like that. If there's one thing I've got, it's grit.

Fuck it though, I still won't be a shinigami. I hold my own sword a little tighter even time I see one of them. If I did become one of those death-soldiers and take a zanpakutou, I'd have to give _this_ sword up - and I'll never do that. There's no soul in this sword, but it's got heart in it.

You paid so much for this damn thing, and I know how much you musta' wanted me to have this to have worked for that much. I'm gonna' put miles on this damn thing before it sees its end. There's heart in this blade. I won't touch you, but I can touch this, and I'm never letting this fucking thing go. You put so much into this sword, and I'm gonna' put all my passion and drive into it too.

That way, even if you do decide to fuck off somewhere and quit following me around, when I meet my end, when I finally become the best, when I get that final battle, you'll be with me even if you're not there.

My friends have disappeared over the years, either getting tired of me always wanting to fight other dudes instead of going woman-hunting, or else they died for some reason or other. If they couldn't understand my ambition, then I guess they weren't the type of friends I wanted, but I miss having some of them around a little from time to time. I miss their stupid faces when they were drunk or them slapping my back and stuff. I feel like my heart needed that when I was younger, but I don't need it now. I'm past that.

I don't miss them enough to make new friends. They'd just get in the way of my new life. I don't know if I could make friends if I tried, or if I even want to. I don't like people. Women are scared of me, and kids are too. Men either don't make eye contact or get too cocky and end up bleeding. Only person that my heart's got room for is you, I guess. I wonder if it's because you're different or just because I've been with you for so long. It doesn't really fucking matter which reason it is, because it's true either way. There's no more room in this heart. You've grown too big in there.

It's hot as fuck and I don't wanna' wear anything more than I gotta'. I hate this goddamn place. There's no decent sake anywhere, and no one knows the meaning of quality penmanship. I can barely read the names on the damn shops, their handwriting's so fucked. Even I could do better if ya' gave me a brush.

I fucking hate this place so much. There's too many perverted men here, there's too many drunks, too many cheats, too many murderers, too many dead little girls in the woods.

There's too many people out here who are helping you in your quest to destroy yourself. Mine too.

You told me all my life that love doesn't exist like that, but you're the one who's been looking for it all this time, and in all the wrong places. Stop, I'd give anything, I wish I had some words to give that could make you open your eyes to how beautiful you are and how much you deserve that isn't _this._ I know you don't feel like that person. You call yourself beautiful and have such disdain for dirt and ugly things, but it's because that's how you feel inside, isn't it. You _hate_ yourself. You hate yourself, and that's why you treat yourself so bad.

I want you to get away from that life, from the drugs, from the dirty men who are gonna' fuck up your health. I want you get away from the hell in your head. Your subconscious mind is seeking out people who make you feel worse and worse and it's so fucking sick. You're gonna' lay down with as many people as you can to try to feel something, but it won't work, Yumichika. This I know.

You're trying to light a candle with all of these wet matches. Use some fucking flint, goddamnit. You don't need matches.

I hope that someday you'll see that, but I know you're too old now, you've been doing this far too long to ever break the habit, and I can't break it for you. I won't be another link in these chains you're wrapping around your neck.

We go into the bar like always, and I sit and order at the counter, I size up the biggest guys and survey for weapons that look promising. I check women too, because I never know for sure if they might feel like fighting a little. Some of the best fights I have are with young women. They don't slack on their technique, that's for sure. You drift off, and there's only one reason you drift off from me. You and a man have made eye contact. That's when I stop paying attention. I've learned not to, because if I don't look, if I don't hear or watch, I can't care as much as I would've.

When you come back in the night and I'm drinking alone by our fire, your hair part has changed, and your kimono is wrapped the other way. You look at my face for a reaction, and I just think 'another one, huh?' Your cheeks are rosy and you're still a little sweaty, but all I see is the deadness in your eyes.

You're right, love doesn't exist. Not that kind of awful love.

I've turned out to be a really angry guy. I have a temper and I always thought I wouldn't turn out to be like my good-for-nothing father, but I did. At least I don't smack girls around, but I drink, and I cuss, and I pick fights just like him, don't I. I'm angry at the world, _fuck_ the world and fuck the people who made the world this way, fuck the people who are living here and don't do something about it.

I'm flintstone, I'm the wick of a firework, I'm a tornado, and I'm ready to blow. I'm gonna' explode and light this whole goddamn place up. It's gonna' go up in flames with me here if I keep this hell inside of me for too long. Gotta' let it out. Gotta' fight. I'm flint and it lights when the swords hit each other, it strikes when the skin breaks.

I only just killed this guy, he only just fell off my blade and the high's just barely worn off so far, but already, I'm itching like crazy. Fuck, I've gotta' have another. Why aren't there any decent fighters out here that could really make me feel like I have to try, like I actually might die if I don't fight for serious? Why isn't there anyone who could fight me so hard that it would satiate me for longer, that I could go for a week without a fix like I used to be able to?

Only thing that calms me down is alcohol and you talking. You don't talk much anymore, so that leaves shots, shots, and fuck, oh my god, who would've guessed, _more shots_. I want you to talk, but I don't need it. I can solve my own problems.

Booze dribbles down my chin as I take a long drag and lean back in the grass.

You raised me to stand up for myself, to not need anyone but me and my fists, and I promise, I'll never go back to how I was. I won't need anything. You wanted this for me, and it's what I want for me too now. You pushed me away from you when I wanted you to protect me so that I'd protect myself. You shut me out when I wanted your comfort so that I'd learn to comfort myself. You didn't play with me much, and I learned other ways to play. You didn't want me to need you, and I won't. I promise, I won't ever need you again.

I've come so far, and I'm the one who made it. I'm the one who did all of it, who did all of that training, but you're the one who got me here. You gave me that push, and I fell into a dead run. I learned a lot from you. You're the one that made me start to believe in something. You're the one who made me feel like I didn't have to feel small and ugly and powerless if I didn't want to, and I grew strong because of that.

What I really appreciate is that you taught me about luck. I think about when you taught me poker and about how winning consistently takes skill, and how winning out of nowhere is luck. You told me about when luck is real, when luck is from god, and when a person makes their _own_ luck. You never said once that I was lucky to have survived. I survive because of my skill, you'd say. You'd congratulate my strength and give merits when they were due.

No, surviving isn't luck in a battle. I survive because I put in the effort to train. That's why I win. Not out of luck, but because I was the better man. If I had been defeated but survived, if the opponent had missed with his killing blow maybe _that_ would be luck but still, I must've been able to get away somehow, and that accounted as my own skill.

Luck from chance would be finding a worthy opponent, a good fight, a good beer for a low price. Luck from god is having lightning strike around you but being left unscathed. That has nothing to do with me, and is all based on the odds or higher power. I'm glad you taught me that, because it really helped me to be proud of myself and my own accomplishments, it taught me not to rely on god or chance for help. It taught me to get shit done with my own two hands. Luck was a powerful force in my life. Like finding you. That didn't have anything to do with me or something I did, because you certainly didn't stick around because I was a nice kid or something. I wonder why you do stay. It has to be some kind of force outside of myself. My mamma always told me I had a lucky star.

I've grown and changed into this person, but you're never gonna' change from who you were, are you? You don't respect yourself. I can see that. You're the rabbit that jumped into the fire. That's how you became the moon on the black waves. You had no value for yourself and lived to serve others, and you perished.

You taught me to have a backbone, but I don't know how to give you one. I don't get how you could know how to make me into a man, how to help me with my problems, but not solve the same ones that are inside you. It should be simple, but I guess it's not. I don't want to think that you're purposefully not trying, that you actually like your fucked up life the way it is.

Want something better, want something more! Value yourself, damnit! I can think those words a thousand times, I could say them double as many, but I could never make you do those things. You have to do it yourself.

I'm harsher with you now. I want you to stick up for yourself. I want you to fight, to _fight_ against anger and shame like you taught me to, I want you to tell me to shut up and fight back against my shit-talk and my bad attitude, but you don't. No matter how fucking far I push you, you don't push back.

You need me to save you, but I won't. You never saved me, and I'm not gonna' save you, because a man's gotta' save himself. You've gotta' save yourself now. I'm not gonna' do it for you. You don't want me to, anyways. That's not who you made me to be. That's not who I am. We're not so different, you and I.

Would you just fucking get better? Would you try harder for yourself and make a better life? Just try it and see how it feels, maybe, I don't fucking know. You're the one who taught me how to not be helpless. You'd always say it, just like that too, 'Don't be helpless, Ikkaku.' I learned how to help myself. You taught me self-respect, but you don't have any for yourself. You gave me a leg-up, but you can't give yourself a boost. You told me there's no such thing as love, and you're a self-fulfilling prophecy, since you search for those who won't love you.

Yeah, beauty's in the eye of the beholder, and the beholder's fucking _blind_. You're blind to the fact that there's a light so close to you, there's more for you if you'll just get an elbow out and then a knee, and then your foot, then roll, and before you know it, you'll be out of this hole.

Don't keep going to bed with those animals. It's that easy. It's that fucking easy. You have a way out, so take it. Kill them, fucking kill them and run away, run away and never stop hating your old life. Save yourself. I see the darkness in your eyes, the uncertainty and meekness in your frame, I see the sadness and how you've been broken down by life and I know something has to give.

Yumichika, you're drowning in the blackness, but why won't you fucking paddle? Save yourself, god-damnit, don't you know how to fucking swim?

 _Please_ , you're my only friend in the world.

I never knew why you looked so unsure about where we were going when you led. We're not going anywhere in particular, so there was no reason to be anxious. I'm not gonna' be like that, so I don't turn around. I just walk.

You're real quiet back there. I can't see you at all if I don't turn around. I can't hear your footsteps half the time, and sometimes it's like that for hours, but I don't turn. I don't need to turn around to know you're there. I know you're there, I don't need to check to know that. Since I know that, there's no reason to turn around - I don't need to guard my back, since you're there. You'd never let someone scar my back. What reason do I have to look behind me?

Sometimes I wonder why I'm so sure how I know you're always going to follow. I guess I don't, but if I doubt, if I falter and you're not there, it's because I'm a man who wasn't worth following. You've stayed for this long, and I'm sure that you will keep doing it. Even if you're quiet for hours and it seems like I'm alone, I won't turn around to see for sure.

You know what happened when Orpheus did that.

I know you'll follow. I've got faith in you. There's no reason to turn around, even if I start to wonder. You didn't fucking raise me to show doubt, and I'm not gonna' look back.

Falter, and you die. Hesitate, and you are lost. I haven't grown into someone who isn't sure of himself. I'm not gonna' look back, no matter what. The only time I ever turn is when I can't hear you that good, and even then I'm only tilting my ear back towards you. I wish you'd speak up a little, Yumichika. It's getting harder and harder to hear you. You've gotta' be louder to break through all this noise in my head.

"Hey, Honey, look my way," comes the jeer for the thousandth time. If I've heard them a thousand, then you've heard them ten thousand.

I don't even turn around. I can't tell what you said, but your tone of voice is promising. I know it's just early resistance though. You'll go off with him if he has coin. I know your game by now.

"Yeah, and you're about to clean it off too," the guy continues, and I know you said something about how filthy he obviously is. "Bet you like the taste of dirt, huh, you little-"

Then I grin so wide my face could split.

I heard you just then. I know an open-palmed slap when I hear it.

There's sounds of a struggle, but I don't turn around. There's shouting, and the loud guy quiets down pretty abruptly with this sick spurting noise. I can hear your heavy breathing, and then silence as we keep walking.

I'm practically glowing with pride for you, but I don't say anything. You can't do this for my merit, for my approval; you have to do this for you and you alone, so I don't say anything and I don't turn around. I don't say anything, but I'm fucking _beaming_.

Maybe there's hope for you. Maybe people can change. If you change for the better, I vow not to falter. I'll stay the man that you've deemed worthy of following. Of all the one-time guys you've seen, you chose me to follow and stay with, and I'm gonna' keep that special something that you saw in me.

The past doesn't change no matter how many times you look back on a memory, so I don't. They come to me occasionally when I'm reminded of something, but I don't sit around and reminisce like a sad fool. I'm focused on this future, because it's gonna' be fucking better than what we've had.

I'm walking towards that. I hope you follow me there. I hope you keep getting better too. I hope you take strength from seeing me succeed and want that for yourself too. You taught me to fly, now try to remember how to get yourself off the ground too.

I'm more than I was now. I'm strong and I'm powerful. I'm not a crybaby, I'm not a coward, I'm not lonely anymore. I fight and I will never lose. Not with you back there. You're who gave me this confidence, this faith in myself.

You made me see that I'm not a lizard-boy, I'm a dragon. That's what I've become ever since you took off my chains. I flew all on my own, but you're the one who set me free.

I have power, and anyone who has a problem with me can talk to my sword. Not that they could. No, I've come so far, and I will never be like you. I will never be like you and I know you didn't _want_ me to be like you. You wanted more for me and I'm gonna' have it.

My steps are larger than yours are. They're surer. They're of a man unfaltering, unfailing, unyielding. I feel like a warrior, and that's what I am. I'm proud. This is who I am, because I grew up with you.

I'm proud. This is the man I've become.

This guy looks promising. Even that little pink-haired baby doesn't put me off from knowing that this'll be the best fight of my life.

I grin and feel my cheeks pinch.


End file.
